Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} The man prosecutors suspect is the East Coast Rapist has been indicted and could go to trial this summer.
Authorities believe Aaron Thomas, 40, of New Haven, is responsible for rapes and other attacks on 17 women from Virginia to Connecticut over the span of a decade.
A grand jury in Prince William County, Va., returned an indictment Tuesday charging Aaron Thomas with abducting three teenage trick-or-treaters on Halloween 2009 and raping two of them. A trial is scheduled for July 31.
Thomas was arrested last year in New Haven and had been held there on charges connected to a 2007 sexual assault. But Connecticut officials agreed to extradite him to Virginia to face charges there first.
In a preliminary trial in Manassas, Virginia
a, three girls he is accused of abducting - two of whom were raped - testified in graphic detail about what occurred. The three women told the court they believed the suspect was armed at the time of the attack, and followed his orders because they were afraid he would kill them.
A police sergeant last month testified that Thomas confessed to the Halloween rapes after he his arrest, but only after complaining that a police sketch failed to depict him properly.
