MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – A woman told police officers that she started off the night in South Beach with two people she trusted and it ended in a nightmare with a frightening stranger, police said.
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The woman told police officers that she remembers being at M2, a nightclub that usually opens from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m., on Friday and Saturday, at 1235 Washington Ave.
She was with her boyfriend and a woman she considered a friend. They both told police officers that after she had too much to drink they left her sleeping in a parked blue 2012 Volkswagen Jetta.
The friend told police, “She and the victim’s boyfriend wanted to have a few more drinks and enjoy their night out,” a Miami Beach police officer wrote in his report, records show.
The victim reported that when she woke up on Saturday morning in the back of her friend’s Volkswagen Jetta she initially thought that the man she was having sexual contact with was her boyfriend.
According to the police report, the victim reported that she saw the man was partially naked and shouted in terror, “I don’t know you!” And the stranger said, “I know you don’t.”
The victim reported she then got out of the Volkswagen and ran to a nearby 7-Eleven that is open 24 hours at Washington Avenue and Ninth Street to ask for help to call 911.
The fingerprints in the Volkswagen helped a detective to identify the suspect as Leon Gordon, Jr., police said. When detectives showed the victim a photo of Gordon, 25, she recognized him.
Detectives released a flyer with Gordon’s photo, and two police officers saw him on Tuesday sitting on a bus bench along Washington Avenue at 11th Street, near the Miami Beach Police Department’s headquarters.
The police officers detained Gordon and detectives questioned him. They reported that he admitted to being in the parked Volkswagen, but he denied the sexual battery, records show.
According to an arrest report, Gordon told detectives that “he felt concerned for her wellbeing and proceeded to knock on the rear passenger side window” and the victim “allowed him” inside.
Inmate records show Miami-Dade correctional deputies booked Gordon, who is 6-foot tall, shortly before 7 p.m., on Tuesday, at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.
Gordon appeared in bond court on Wednesday, when prosecutors filed a case for charges of burglary with assault or battery and indecent exposure.
Court records show the judge denied him bond over the felony charge; set his bond for indecent exposure, a misdemeanor charge, at $500; and ordered him to stay away from the victim.
Miami-Dade County Circuit Judge Michelle Delancey is set to preside over the case. Records show police officers considered Gordon to be homeless and unemployed.
Miami Beach police officers had arrested Gordon on Feb. 12 for trespassing, a misdemeanor; and for camping in a prohibited area, a violation of a municipal ordinance.
Records show Gordon was released with the case pending on Feb. 13 and he has a status hearing on March 12 with Miami-Dade County Circuit Judge Marcus Bach Armas.