By Shayna Jacobs
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A convicted criminal who nearly got away with a brutal attack and attempted rape of a teenage girl was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Tuesday after a DNA match cracked the case.
Prosecutors said Curtis Tucker, 46, almost killed a 15-year-old girl who he followed into a Hamilton Heights apartment building in 2004.
Tucker "choked her several times" then grabbed her money, a student MetroCard and a one-dollar bill, prosecutors said.
But she "fought like a lion" and battled with him as they tumbled down a flight of stairs in her building where, as she lay badly injured with a broken nose and bloodied face, Tucker "pulled off her pants and tried to rape her," Assistant District Attorney Melissa Mourges said Tuesday.
Although he was not apprehended then, the struggle left some of Tucker's DNA — in the form of a trail of blood drops — at the scene. And in 2010, investigators were able to match the DNA sample to his profile, which was submitted to the state database after he was convicted for assaulting and robbing a 74-year-old man during a home invasion.
Tucker pleaded guilty to the attack on the girl on April 21, 2010 in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance Jr. said the attempted rape case illustrates a need to make it mandatory for all convicted criminals to provide a DNA sample, not just felonies and select misdemeanors. Tucker had several criminal conviction prior to his 2010 felony conviction, but he was not required to submit his DNA in those cases, Vance said.
"If the law had been corrected to include DNA collection upon all convictions, this case would have been solved years earlier, as this defendant was prosecuted for multiple additional crimes after the attempted rape," Vance said in a statement.
Vance has been promoting legislation reform and said he believes expanding the DNA database by including more misdemeanor offenders would be effective crime prevention.
Critics oppose the proposal on the grounds that it would violate civil liberties to require low-level misdemeanor offenders to give a biological sample to authorities.
Tucker's attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.
