A Howard jury faces the “he said, she said” dilemma in determining whether a Columbia teen attacked and raped a young woman behind the Columbia Association tennis court in October 2007.
Dedrick Wilkerson, 18, could face up to life in prison if convicted of first-degree rape, sex offense and assault charges in connection with the alleged attack on a 23-year-old woman that Wilkerson met about 9 p.m. Oct. 18 at a Columbia Bank ATM machine in the Wilde Lake Village Shopping Center.
Howard Detective D.M. Francis testified Wednesday that police linked Wilkerson to the incident through DNA evidence and the victim’s identification of him in a bank surveillance video and a photograph.
Despite the evidence stacked against him, Wilkerson appeared relaxed and confident Wednesday.
He seemed unfazed when the prosecutor played an audio recording of detectives interviewing Wilkerson in November 2007.
During the interview, Wilkerson denied ever meeting the victim even though he was caught on the bank surveillance video with her.
When detectives told him he was accused of raping the victim, he responded by asking, “Is she dead?”
Wilkerson then said he “was locked up” when the incident occurred, because he’d violated his probation by trespassing.
The Department of Parole and Probation had been monitoring Wilkerson with an electronic ankle bracelet at the time of the attack, and he was only permitted to go to school at the Ellicott City Homewood Center for troubled youth.
“I’m on the box … I can’t go outside and most definitely not at that time,” Wilkerson said in the interview.
“I know I didn’t do nothing.”
The interview tape provided jurors with a brief insight into Wilkerson’s criminal past, but specific charges and court records could not be obtained, because he was a juvenile at the time.
Defense attorney Mary Pizzo said Wilkerson lied to police about meeting the victim, because he was scared of getting in trouble for drug involvement.
She said the victim consented to having sex with Wilkerson in exchange for drugs and may have lied about the rape, because she was angry she never received the drugs or she didn’t want to tell her family the truth.
The jury was expected to begin deliberations Thursday evening.
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