© ShutterstockPolice responding to a 911 call found Robert Pondexter, 57 -- and his crackpipe -- at around 5:45 a.m. Saturday on East New York Avenue, between Schenectady and Troy avenues, the sources allege.
Cops responding to a 911 call found Robert Pondexter, 57 with a crack pipe at around 5:45 a.m. Saturday on East New York Avenue between Schenectady and Troy avenues, the sources allege.
Pondexter had been walking across the street from the Concern Heights Apartments building, a supportive housing development on the block, when he allegedly grabbed the woman by the collar and pulled her into a school parking lot.
He and the 58-year-old victim were strangers, a police source said.
The woman said Pondexter choked her and forced her to perform oral sex before demanding she take off her pants — but she was able to kick him away.
Pondexter had been detained at Rikers on a prior rape charge relating to an attack on a different woman whom he had allegedly known and used drugs with, though the charges were later dropped when the victim became uncooperative, sources said.
He was in jail on an unrelated parole violation when he was released on April 15 as part of an effort to improve social distancing and reduce the spread of the virus at Rikers.
The woman he allegedly attacked on Saturday was taken to a hospital and Pondexter was arrested at the scene. He faces charges of attempted rape and sexual assault, among others, sources said.
He was still awaiting arraignment in Brooklyn Criminal Court on Sunday evening.
Mayor de Blasio has previously said that roughly 2,000 city inmates have been released since mid-March due to the pandemic.
About 3 percent of those released have since become reoffenders, according to city figures.
Comment: Or more accurately, only 3 percent have been caught reoffending.
Earlier this month, a convicted murderer who was cut loose from Rikers Island amid the viral outbreak there was promptly rearrested for bank robbery.
"Some have done the wrong thing and they'll pay the consequences. The vast majority haven't," de Blasio said on Fox News on Sunday.
De Blasio's reps said that recidivists would be tried for their alleged crimes.
"The justice system will and should take its course here and hold these individuals accountable," one of those reps said.
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