Homeless man faces jail time on rape charge

March 3, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

Charles Hudson

YOUNGSTOWN

A jury expects to begin deliberations today in the case against a homeless man accused of abducting and raping a 15-year-old girl as she walked to school.

Charles Hudson, 55, who gives no permanent address but was arrested at an abandoned house in Campbell, has been on trial this week in the courtroom of Judge Lou D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

Prosecutors and defense attorneys rested their cases Wednesday afternoon. Their summations start this morning followed by the jury’s deliberations.

Hudson could face a total of 20 years in prison if convicted on both charges.

Police said the 15-year-old, a 10th-grader at Campbell Memorial High School at the time, was abducted at knife point on Tremble Avenue near 13th Street around 7 a.m. Oct. 12 a few streets away from her home. She was taken to an abandoned house on Gordon Avenue, where the rape occurred.

Natasha Frenchko, an assistant county prosecutor, called several witnesses to testify earlier in the week including the victim, now 17, and Campbell police officers who worked on the case.

Atty. Fernando Mack, a Cleveland attorney representing Hudson, called only one witness to the stand before resting his case. He called Clarence Hudson, a retired Campbell police officer and brother of the defendant, to the stand.

Clarence Hudson told jurors his brother is not homeless, but was in fact living at the address where the alleged assault took place.

He also testified to the busy nature of the area where the alleged abduction took place by saying he recently went to the area and witnessed many children walking to school, a school bus and a parking lot of cars at a nearby housing complex.

Frenchko, on cross-examination, asked Clarence Hudson if he had been present in the area the day the alleged incident took place, to which he said no.