A career criminal has confessed to two sex attacks in the Bronx — one against a runaway teen girl last year and one involving a 40-year-old woman more than two decades ago, the Daily News has learned.
Jamel Clay, 42, was linked to both crimes by his DNA and was busted Monday night, police said. But the the early case, in 1996, may run up against statute-of-limitation problems, sources said.
The latest incident happened last July 10 when Clay confronted a 15-year-old girl in St. Mary’s Park, by St. Ann’s Ave. and E. 149th St.
Sgt. Keri Thompson, who heads the DNA Cold Case Squad for the Special Victims Unit, said Clay chatted up the teen and offered to buy her clothing.
But when he tried to kiss her she resisted, Thompson said, and he sexually assaulted her.
“They walked off together afterwards,” Thompson said. “They were going to a clothing store. She didn’t know what to say or do, but the next thing she knows, he’s gone.”
Remarkably, the teen was able to tell police his name because she saw his ID at one point. But Clay has a number of addresses, including homeless shelters, and could not immediately be located.
When the DNA results came back in October they confirmed Clay as the attacker, Thompson said — and linked him to an Oct. 26, 1996, rape.
That night, a 40-year-old woman waiting for her sister at Stratford Ave. and Bruckner Blvd., was approached by Clay, who said hello to her.
When the woman sensed something was wrong and tried to walk off, Clay followed and forced her into a nearby schoolyard, where he raped her at knifepoint and allegedly stole $18, Thompson said.
Clay has 32 prior arrests in the city, including for felonies such as robbery, burglary and grand larceny. But his convictions were for misdemeanors that did not require him to provide a DNA sample. The law was expanded in 2012 to include convictions for all felonies and misdemeanors.
“That’s why SVU in 2015 started the DNA Cold Case Squad,” Thompson said. “We’re getting so many DNA hits.”
The rape victim, now in her early 60s, was glad to hear her long wait for justice appears to be over, Thompson said.
Clay, who was busted in the Bronx last year for public lewdness and has a Virginia arrest for masturbating in public, was ordered held on $25,000 bail after he was arraigned Tuesday night on statutory rape charges for the 2017 incident.
The Bronx district attorney’s office is deferring prosecution in the 1996 case. The statute of limitations for rape was lifted in 2006, allowing offenses dating back five years to be prosecuted.
Even so, if Clay fled the jurisdiction to run out the clock, he may still face prosecution based on an exception in the law, sources said.
