THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, January 23, 1997 TAG: 9701230313
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JUNE ARNEY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: 80 lines
Six Super Bowls later, a fugitive who skipped bail and fled the country will face 17 charges stemming from what authorities say was a 1991 Super Bowl party-turned-gang-rape in Deep Creek.
Mark A. Michael, 28, is expected to be brought back to the area today from Canada by Chesapeake detectives to face charges that include rape and attempted murder.
Michael was located about a week ago in Toronto and detained as he apparently was trying to get back into the United States, said prosecutor Larry Willis, who handled the case.
Michael had been found in India a couple of years ago, Willis said, but federal authorities did not bring him back. Willis said he was not sure why.
Michael failed to show up for a General District Court hearing in April 1991, skipping out on a $50,000 bond, Willis said.
``It will be nice to close this,'' Willis said Wednesday. ``I hate unfinished business.''
Prosecutors say the crimes apparently began with sex bets on the outcome of the 1991 Super Bowl between the New York Giants and the Buffalo Bills, and ended with a 19-year-old girl and a 16-year-old girl bound and blindfolded.
The two Virginia Beach teen-agers went to a house in the 400 block of E. Blanche Drive in Deep Creek to watch the game with three men. After the game, one of the men, Robert A.``Slick'' Swift Jr., and the 19-year-old had consensual sex.
Prosecutors said the house's resident, Michael, then 22, pulled a handgun after the younger girl refused to have sex with him. Swift also had a gun, evidence showed.
The Virginian-Pilot does not identify victims of sexual offenses.
The younger girl told police she was blindfolded and raped by all three men. She said the barrel of a gun was put into her mouth and the trigger was pulled but the weapon did not fire.
As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors dropped the more serious rape charge and other abduction and firearm charges against co-defendant Swift, then 22, of the 3300 block of Illinois Ave. in Norfolk. In exchange, he agreed to testify against his co-defendants. He faced a possible life term on the rape charge.
Instead, Swift pleaded guilty to abduction and firearm charges, and was sentenced to 12 years in prison.
Carlton V. Shell, 25, of the 900 block of Druid Circle in Norfolk, was sentenced to 13 years in prison for abduction and two firearms charges.
At the time of the crimes, the 19-year-old girl said: ``We all went over there to have a nice time, not for anything like that to happen.''
Both teen-agers at times were blindfolded and bound with their clothing and repeatedly threatened with death, the woman said in an interview at the time.
`I honest-to-God thought they were going to kill us,'' the girl said at the time. ``But Robert (Swift) kept telling me, `Don't worry. Don't worry. Don't worry. They're just playing with her.' ''
In a jail interview in 1991, Swift agreed with the 19-year-old's version, to a point. But no one, he said, was forced to do anything at gunpoint and there were no rapes or threats.
The five had become acquaintances in the two months before the game, Swift said.
The teen-agers accepted an invitation to come over during the Super Bowl game where Swift, Michael and the teens drank a 12-pack of Milwaukee's Best beer and munched barbecue chips as they watched the last 10 minutes of the game.
Swift and the 19-year-old made a bet on the championship game's outcome: The loser had to do anything the winner asked. Swift said Michael and the 16-year-old made the same bet. The 19-year-old said she didn't hear them.
The men selected the New York Giants, who survived a failed field-goal attempt on the last play and won by a point.
Swift and the 19-year-old went off to one bedroom and had consensual sex, they both said.
At one point, the 19-year-old said, she saw Michael pull a gun on the younger girl before those two went into the bedroom. She said Michael also forced her back into the other bedroom where Swift bound and blindfolded her. Swift said no gun was used. He said he doesn't know what happened between the younger girl and Michael in the bedroom.
Swift said his partner allowed herself to be bound.
KEYWORDS: RAPE