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Last updated on Monday, February 1, 2016
(BLOOMINGTON) - During a November court hearing, Jerald Honeycutt pleaded guilty, saying he was the one who broke into two homes and raped the women living there.
Both sexual assaults happened in Bloomington. The first rape happened in 1999 involving a 62-year-old woman and the second in June 2015 with a 73-year-old woman.
He told the judge he understood the plea agreement, which would sentence him to 15-year prison sentence for the 1999 rape, and 30 years for one last June and place him on a 10 years of probation.
Charges of burglary, strangulation and two other rape charges will be dismissed.
But on Thursday, 35-year-old Honeycutt told the judge he was not sure he wanted to plead guilty.
Monroe County deputy public defender Jeremy Noel says his client agreed to plead guilty because he faced spending the rest of his life behind bars if he was convicted by a jury. Noel then reminded Honeycutt about the DNA evidence against him and going to trial may not be the best option.
Monroe Circuit Court Judge Marc Kellams scheduled a February 4 hearing on Honeycutt's request to rescind his admission and proceed to trial.
Judge Kellams gave Honeycutt and his client one week to decide how they will proceed.
According to police, DNA from hair left on a comforter in the most recent attack matched DNA evidence collected from the 1999 assault. That DNA matched Honeycutt's.
According to a probable cause affidavit, in the 1999 case, Honeycutt, who was 18, climbed through a window of a home in the 300 block of Johnson Avenue. He grabbed the 62-year-old woman from behind, held her by the neck and sexually assaulted her in a bedroom.
In the 2015 case, the woman told police she was sleeping on her couch and woke to find a man putting his hand over her face and mouth. Honeycutt then pressed his forearm into her throat, pinning her down. He then threatened her with a knife or box cutter saying he would cut her eyes out or slit her throat.
The 73-year-old woman was assaulted twice in her living room and then dragged to a bedroom where he raped her again.
She was able to activate a health-alert system which sounded a loud alarm scaring Honeycutt who fled.
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