Fort Bragg soldier facing rape charges

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Tags:

cumberland county, fort bragg, sex offense, local/state

CUMBERLAND COUNTY, N.C. (WTVD) -- A Fort Bragg soldier is facing rape charges and the alleged victim shared her story.

Thirty-seven-year-old Donald Bleyl was arrested Tuesday, but according to the victim, more arrests may come.

The woman said she was drugged and she really doesn't remember the rape. She said that she feels maybe that is the reason investigators didn't initially believe her. Now, finally, over two weeks after the brutal crime, a soldier has been charged.

"I don't remember what happened and I fully do believe because they drugged me," said woman.

It was just supposed to be a drink. One or two drinks at a neighborhood bar and then she'd walk home, but then something happened.

"Ok, like come on, 'We'll take you home.' I walked out the door and I blacked out," said the woman. "I didn't come back to until I was actually at the end of this trailer park on the main road, coming into it. They said I had on a man's sized hoodie that had Special Forces. The detective did tell me that they did end up recovering that hoodie."

The 22 year old said she was raped and possibly ganged raped by a Special Forces soldier and the people who watched at a Spring Lake bar more than two weeks ago.

"I told them, if I was that incoherent, if I was in that kind of position where I couldn't stand up, throwing up, I don't see how it could be possible for me to beg anybody to anything to me," said the woman.

She's angry that nobody believed her and possibly believed Bleyl instead, until he was charged.

"As a victim, I don't feel that it's fair that because I don't' remember exactly what happened to me, then that means it didn't happen or that basically at the end of the day, they have to go off the word of the people who stood by and watch me be raped rather than go off of my word," said the woman.

ABC11 has learned there were several witnesses who watched that alleged rape. The Cumberland County Sheriff's Office would only say that the investigation is ongoing and that there will be more charges filed at some point.

Meanwhile, Bleyl is being held in the Cumberland County Detention Center under a $50,000 bond.