Warren police identify homicide victim

STAFF REPORT

WARREN — Police have identified the body found in woods behind Western Reserve Middle School as Donovan L. Toles, 23, of Laird Avenue Southeast, who was reported missing by his family in mid-October.

The Trumbull County coroner has ruled the death a homicide as a result of multiple gunshot wounds.

Warren police talked to a girlfriend and various members of Toles’ family Oct. 17, some of them saying they had received text messages indicating that Toles had been abducted and his body could be found near Tod Place Northwest or Mike Place Southwest.

Police checked the area of Tod Place near the former St. Joseph Hospital but did not locate him.

A hunter found Toles’ body in a wooded area off of Hamilton Street Southwest, about a mile and a half west of Mike Place, on Saturday afternoon, police said.

Police are continuing the investigation this week but have made no arrests, said Sgt. Jeff Cole of the Warren Police Department.

Toles’ death is the ninth homicide in Warren this year, three more than recorded in 2008.

Toles was charged earlier this year with abduction and assault after a 21-year-old man and 18-year-old woman said Toles and another man abducted and assaulted them in a house where they were staying on Porter Street Northeast in March.

A Trumbull County grand jury later refused to indict Toles on the abduction charge, but he pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor assault in Warren Municipal Court.

Toles was sent to prison for two years in early 2007 for violating terms of his probation on a 2005 robbery.

Warren police charged him with drug possession in 2008. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge.