
A 71-year-old man, suspected of raping two women at gunpoint has been arrested by police after a long car chase in Los Angeles, United States. He was identified as a serial rapist from the US state of Massachusetts who had been on the run for a decade. The 71-year-old Stephen Paul Gale was driving a Lincoln SUV while trying to escape from police pursuit before surrendering around 5:30 pm (local time), reported Fox News Digital.
The man arrestedhas been identified as Stephen Paul Gale and is charged with four counts of rape, a count of armed robbery of two women in a Framingham, Massachusettsstore in 1989, and two counts of kidnapping. The authorities with the USMarshals Service publicly identified Gale as the suspect in May 2024.
WFXT Boston 25 News reported that Gale was 37 years old when he entered a storecalled Hit or Miss on 27 December 1989, armed with a handgun. According to the reports, he forced two women to the back of the store, made them empty all the money from the locker, made them undress and put them in separate rooms.
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“He sexually assaulted both women while holding the gun to their heads,”Middlesex County District Attorney Marian Ryan's office told the Boston outlet at the time.It added, "When [Gale] returned to the front of the store, the victims fled out the rear fire door to a nearby home.”
After the crime, the left-behind evidence was used to create a DNA report, though it was an unsuccessful attempt to catch him.The police later used a forensic approach and found Gale as the suspect.
The USMarshals Service said that the 71-year-old man was also suspected of similar sexual assaults between1989 and 1990 in the great Boston area.
The suspect was reportedly taken to hospital for treatment of an unknown disease, which will be furtherlooked afterin prison.
(With inputs from agencies)