A Fayette County jury in the re-trial of 27-year-old William Jeffrey Dumas found the former Hampton man guilty of raping a Fayetteville Down Syndrome woman in 2010.
Dumas had been convicted of two counts of rape and aggravated sodomy in 2012 and sentenced by Georgia Appeals Court Judge Christopher McFadden the minimum sentence of 25 years in prison and probation for life. The Dumas jury in the re-trial that ended Aug. 25 found him guilty of one count of rape. Dumas was subsequently sentenced by Judge Tommy Hankinson to 25 years in prison and lifetime probation.
Previous reporting by The Citizen noted that the incidents in late 2010 were alleged to have occurred at a home on Hickory Avenue west of Fayetteville off Ga. Highway 54, though neither Dumas nor the 24-year-old victim lived in the home. The victim would often stay there with a relative when her mother had to travel for work, and Dumas would stay there occasionally because he was a friend of the homeowner, attorneys at the time explained.
District Attorney Scott Ballard said that, unlike in the original trial, the defense in the re-trial had Dumas testify and called several character witnesses.
The jury at the conclusion of the re-trial found Dumas guilty of one count of rape. Judge Tommy Hankinson sentenced Dumas to 25 years in prison and probation for life, Ballard said.
“I thought the jury worked very hard on the case and I was pleased with the verdict,” Ballard said on Aug. 28.
The move that triggered the re-trial came by way of Judge McFadden in early 2014, who tried the 2012 case with the permission of Superior Court Judge Chris Edwards who thought McFadden needed trial experience, said Ballard.
McFadden wrote in a lengthy order that the decision to grant a new trial was justified based on his assessments of inconsistencies in the victim’s testimony and the lack of evidence that she “exhibited visible distress” in being around the defendant immediately following the alleged rape incidents.
McFadden thought the victim did not act like a victim should act and that Dumas did not act like the kind of monster who would do these things, Ballard said last week.
In a joint letter submitted to The Citizen in March 2014, Sara Hart Weir of the National Down Syndrome Society and Susan Goodman of the National Down Syndrome Congress advocated for a Change.org petition calling for McFadden to be removed from the bench.
The seven-day re-trial began on Aug. 17.
