A Massachusetts man is facing a new rape charge after spending 30 years in prison for the rape of an elderly woman back in 1985 that he said he did not commit.
George Perrot, 50, was exonerated in 2016 for the alleged rape of a 78-year-old woman when he was 17 years old. Now Perrot is back in jail, this time after being accused of drugging a woman with heroin and raping her.
A police officer discovered Perrot unconscious on top of the partially clothed woman who was also unconscious on a sidewalk in Lawrence, Mass., back in January, the Republican (a local newspaper) reported Friday. The officer observed Perot with his face between the woman’s legs. When the officer tried to wake Perrot up, he allegedly became combative, charging the officer who had to beat him with a police baton to subdue him.
The woman told police that Perrot gave her powder, which officials believe was heroin, but could not remember what happened next. The woman said she was not dating Perrot and did not consent to having sex with him. He was charged with raping the woman orally, open and gross lewdness, resisting arrest, and assault and battery on a police officer.
In 1985, Perrot, who was then 17, was arrested for breaking into a home and raping a 78-year-old woman. He was charge with two different break-ins at the time and admitted to one but claimed he never assaulted the elderly woman. He was convicted of the crime in 1987 but still maintained his innocence. He appealed the original guilty verdict and a new trial was held in 1992, but he was once more found guilty and again sentenced to life in prison. During that trial, prosecutors used a hair sample found in the house where the rape occurred that they alleged matched Perrot’s hair.
After the two trials and three decades in prison, Perrot made national headlines in 2016 when his conviction was overturned and he was released released on bail after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court said that the evidence in the case, namely microscopic hair fiber, “exceeded foundational science.” His indictment being tossed was lauded by groups like the Innocence Project and the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism. A third trial was ordered, but prosecutors eventually tossed the case.
Two years after being released from prison, Perrot filed a lawsuit against police and FBI involved in the original case seeking damages for his “wrongful arrest and prosecution.”
Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni said in a statement after his new arrest that he and prosecutors still maintain Perrot’s guilt for the previous allegations.
“We have and do continue to maintain the position that George Perrot committed several heinous offenses of elderly female victims,” the statement read. “Regrettably, there is another victim who has now allegedly suffered at his hands three decades later.”
Perrot entered a not guilty plea to the charges in court on Jan. 7. A grand jury indicted him in March, and the case was transferred to Essex Superior Court.
