JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A Jacksonville sex offender was arrested this week, 12 years after a woman reported she was beaten and raped at a vacant home in Woodland Acres.
The woman reported to the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office in 2006 that she was raped on Jasper Avenue, and completed a rape kit.
This sex offender was arrested 12 years after a woman reported she was raped in this #Jacksonville neighborhood. Her rape kit wasn't sent to the lab until 2016. Seven years after the reported rape, McClusky was convicted of raping a child. I'm live at 5:30 on CBS47 @ActionNewsJax pic.twitter.com/8qOaE7Q5GJ
— Jenna Bourne (@jennabourneWTSP) March 30, 2018
Mikel McClusky raped a child at a Jacksonville motel in 2012, while that 2006 rape kit sat untested.
“It’s just awful how long it does take to find these criminals,” said Joni Grogan, who lives on Jasper Avenue.
When the rape was reported in 2006, JSO spokesperson Melissa Bujeda said the agency’s protocol for victims who were unwilling to participate in prosecution was to store their rape kits as evidence and not send them to the state for testing.
That changed in 2016 when JSO got a federal grant to test the kits, investigate and prosecute the cases, and reach back out to victims.
“DNA evidence does not expire. It’s always good,” said former sex crimes investigator and Action News Jax Crime and Safety Expert Ken Jefferson. “This may be the link that will take this individual off the street due to his violent criminal behavior.”
McClusky was also found guilty of sexually assaulting a child in 1997.
Last week, the State Attorney’s Office asked the court to label McClusky a “sexually violent predator” and involuntarily commit him to a mental hospital.
#JSO tells me the rape kit was not sent to the state lab for 10 years because the agency got a federal grant in 2016 to test rape kits of victims who were unwilling to prosecute at the time they were collected. @ActionNewsJax pic.twitter.com/ftbawsexOp
— Jenna Bourne (@jennabourneWTSP) March 30, 2018
Court documents say McClusky “suffers from a mental abnormality and/or personality disorder which makes him likely to engage in acts of sexual violence.”
Since the rape was reported in 2006, court records show McClusky has been the subject of eight other cases in Duval County Court.
According to the organization End the Backlog, there are more than 13,000 untested rape kits in Florida.
Cox Media Group
