Like a lot of you, I was confused by District Attorney Stan Rebert's comments in Thursday's York Daily Record regarding suspected serial rapist Michael L. Johnson Jr.'s fleeing.
Johnson, suspected of three rapes in which he posed as a police officer, which he used to be, was supposed to turn himself in to face charges in two of the cases.
He was out on $100,000 bail on charges filed in Maryland at the time.
He didn't show.
Now, it might just be me, but if you have a person suspected of multiple offenses, out on bail, do you call him up and say, "Hey, we're going to file some more charges so how about stopping by the police station?"
It seemed very odd. And it was very odd that authorities were surprised that Johnson took off.
Which brings us to Rebert. He said, "I don't like the fact that this guy got away. But he is the one who posted bail and ran. Shame on him, not us."
Shame on him?
I'm sure he's feeling pretty bad about being out on the loose. Shame on him for running and being, in the words of authorities, armed and dangerous.
Another thing: York Police had one case, a rape of an admitted prostitute and drug addict in which the victim got the license plate number of the person who raped her. The number matched that on the van that Johnson allegedly used in his crimes.
That happened in September. True, the van was registered to a friend of Johnson, but how much investigating would it have taken to tie that van to Johnson and eventually get an ID from the victim.
That's how Baltimore police cracked the case, tracing the van to Johnson and showing the victim a photo array that included Johnson's driver's license photo.
The Baltimore rape occurred in November. Could it have been prevented had York police caught Johnson in September?
Lots of questions.
Not many good answers.
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