Cops: Man tried to smother girlfriend

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

Police reports said a man held his girlfriend in a Riblett Avenue home Saturday and tried to smother her with a pillow before she was able to escape.

Dondeon Johnson, 23, of Youngstown, was arraigned in municipal court Monday on charges of unlawful restraint and felonious assault. Judge Elizabeth Kobly set his bond at $50,000.

Reports said officers were called to a home in the 1900 block of Riblett Avenue about 10:25 p.m. Saturday for a report of a woman being held against her will. When officers got there, the woman told them she and Johnson had been arguing and he was upset because she did not want to see him anymore, reports said.

The woman had her 3-year-old son with her also, reports said. She told police Johnson was in an upstairs bedroom and police called for Johnson to come down and talk to them.

An officer, however, spotted Johnson trying to come out a window and he was ordered to the ground at gunpoint, reports said. After he was cuffed, the woman told police Johnson threatened her with a knife and said he would kill her and her son and the child she is carrying. Reports said the woman is five months pregnant.

The woman said Johnson choked her and punched her in the face, and then grabbed her and her son as they tried to run out the door and threw him back inside. Reports said Johnson told the woman because she tried to run he would have to kill her and her son, reports said.

He forced her to go upstairs and began smothering her with a pillow and continued until the woman said she loved him.

Johnson then got up and the woman managed to have a friend call 911 for her, reports said.