DNA evidence brings guilty pleas in Durham rape cases, one from 17 years ago
Two men in Durham were convicted of rape in separate “cold cases” Monday, including one that occurred 17 years ago and whose victim died this year before she could see her attacker sentenced.
The Durham County District Attorney’s Office announced the convictions, which came as a result of previously untested DNA evidence in Durham’s Sexual Assault Kit Initiative, according to a news release.
In one case, 59-year-old Timothy Rorie pleaded guilty to second-degree rape, first-degree burglary, first-degree kidnapping and sexual battery for breaking into a woman’s home on Sept. 8, 2005, and sexually assaulting her, according to the release.
He was charged this February after saliva collected from the victim connected him to the crime, the release stated.
The victim, who was in her 70s at the time of the assault, lived to see her rapist arrested, according to the district attorney’s office. “Unfortunately, the victim in this case passed away shortly after Rorie was charged,” the release stated.
On Monday, Rorie was sentenced to between roughly 12 1/2 years and 16 years in prison, followed by 10 years of wearing an ankle monitor for satellite tracking. He also was ordered to register as a sex offender and never have contact with the victim’s family.
In the other case, 27-year-old Carlos Dominguez-Aguiar pleaded guilty to first-degree rape and first-degree burglary for breaking into a woman’s home on May 31, 2015, and sexually assaulting her at knifepoint, according to the release. He was charged in August 2021 when DNA testing connected him to the assault on the woman, who was in her 30s at the time.
On Monday, he was sentenced to between 16 years and 24 years and 3 months in prison, followed by 10 years of wearing an ankle monitor for satellite tracking. He was ordered to register as a sex offender and to never have contact with the victim.
Neither man is a known suspect in any other reported sexual assaults, according to Durham police and the district attorney.
Clearing the rape-kit backlog
More than a dozen people have been charged by the Durham Police Department’s Cold Case Sexual Assault Unit. With Monday’s convictions, seven have been convicted in 10 assaults dating back to 2005.
In 2019, after state officials reported 15,000 untested sexual assault kits in North Carolina, state Attorney General Josh Stein said Durham was second to Asheville in getting backlogged kits tested, though over 1,000 kits in the city remained untested, The News & Observer reported.
Today the Durham Police Department is nearly finished testing all kits that meet the State Crime Lab criteria, with 1,418 tests submitted, a department spokesperson told The News & Observer in an email.
As of July 16, there had been 73 forcible rapes reported to Durham police this year, compared to 70 at this time last year, department statistics show.
Through June, the department had cleared 32% of this year’s reported rapes. That is higher than the national rape clearance rate of 24% for similar-size cities in 2020, the most recent year for which police had clearance data.
But police never get a chance to investigate most sexual assaults.
According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, rape is vastly underreported with 63% of cases not reported to law enforcement. The center estimates 1 in 5 women and 1 in 71 men will be raped during their lifetime.
In Monday’s release, District Attorney Satana Deberry thanked Durham police and said she was “heartened that, after years of waiting, the survivors in both of these cases were able to see their attackers identified and receive some closure.”
The latest cases were prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Angela Garcia-Lamarca, who works with the Police Department’s Cold Case Sexual Assault Unit.
This story was originally published August 1, 2022 at 8:57 PM.