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Hooters Cook Busted for 20-Year-Old Rape After Applying for City Job

By DNAinfo Staff on March 15, 2010 12:01pm  | Updated on March 15, 2010 11:59am

A man who worked as a short-order cook at a New York City Hooters restaurant is going to prison for a 20-year-old rape.
A man who worked as a short-order cook at a New York City Hooters restaurant is going to prison for a 20-year-old rape.
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Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images

MANHATTAN — A short-order cook applying for a city job in Manhattan, instead found himself headed to Rikers Island after authorities discovered he was wanted in a 20-year-old rape case, according to a published report.

David Price, 54, walked into a Manhattan courthouse to prove his old case had been resolved by looking in his old file, the Daily News reported. Rather than exonerating him, the file contained a bench warrant for Price's arrest dating back to 1980.

Price and Clifford Gamble were convicted of robbing and raping a prostitute at gunpoint in 1980, the paper reported. Price and Gamble both skipped out on bail and went into hiding during the trial.

Price spent the last 20 years working as a bike messenger and as a cook at Hooters. He also raised a son, the News reported.

Price was arrested in 1996 on a drug charge and in 2005 for hitting a girlfriend, but his fingerprints were never matched up with the old case.

"They could have [put me away] two other times," Price told the News. "Now I'm old and they want to mess with me?"

Price will spend at least six years in state prison for the 20-year-old crime. Gamble returned to face his crime in 1980 and was sentenced to four to 12 years, the paper reported. He was released from jail in 1984.