SPRINGFIELD — A former resident of Maine hobbled into a courtroom in Hampden Superior Court to plead guilty to a rape and kidnapping in Holland that happened 25 years ago.
Struggling to use a cane while handcuffed, Jamie A. Dodge admitting to abducting and raping a woman during her Sunday walk around her neighborhood on July 23, 2000, just before 11:30 that morning.
He was sentenced to 12 to 15 years in state prison.
According to the victim’s account to law enforcement over the years, a white man grabbed her from behind, clamped a hand over her mouth and dragged her into the woods. Forcing the woman to her knees and tearing items of clothing, he raped the woman then told her to lie on the ground and count to 500 before she got up and left the wooded area.
“You’re coming with me, woman,” Assistant Hampden District Attorney Elizabeth Dunphy Farris told a judge Wednesday afternoon, quoting Dodge to a judge. “Since I’m in a good mood today, I’ll let you go.”
As the victim attempted to crawl away from him on her knees, Dodge threatened her.
“I’ll hurt you worse than you have ever been hurt before,” he said.
After Dunphy Farris recited the facts of the prosecution’s case, Superior Court Judge Tracy Duncan asked Dodge whether he agreed with the version and still wished to plead guilty.
“Yes, ma’am,” he quietly repeated several times.
The victim was not present during the proceeding, as appearing in court in a previous hearing to tell her story had shaken her so badly.
Dodge’s conviction is significant not only as a conclusion to a decades-old case, but it was the first one in Hampden County to be solved using specific advances in DNA analysis Hampden District Attorney Hampden District Anthony D. Gulluni has employed in cold cases.
Police were led to Dodge after his father, Edward Dodge, gave a voluntary DNA sample and compared to the victim’s DNA that had been preserved in the investigation.
Although he told Duncan he was a married father of two adult sons, a woman identified as his girlfriend got peripherally ensnared in the case.
Court records show Mary N. Haley, of Ware, who made very public scenes in the earliest proceeding after Dodge’s arrest, is incarcerated after being charged with two counts of witness intimidation.
She was charged in Palmer District Court on May 28.
The charges stem from alleged statements she made to Dodge on a recorded jail phone line.
“Do you think I want to hear that you have to talk to your lawyer about how many years this (expletive) is going to give you”, “I’m literally ready to drive to Springfield bust into that district attorney’s office and drag her out of that (expletive) place and beat her in the (expletive) street,” a statement of facts by police read. quoting Haley.
The police records do not identify the victims by name.
“These people have ruined my life and will get even with every mother (expletive) one of them and I don’t care what happens I don’t give a (expletive) anymore; I don’t give a (expletive),” the police report reads.
“At approximately minute 17:36 she expresses, ‘As far as the DA is concerned she is not going to worry about trying your case, she won’t be there to do it, another passage reads.”
Haley, 57, remains held behind bars after a dangerous hearing earlier this year.
The reason District Court Judge Michael E. Mulcahy gave to continue Haley’s incarceration, was:
“Made outrageous threats against prosecutor and alleged victim in aggravated rape case,” the judge wrote.
Read the original article on MassLive.
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