Rape case proceeds despite false claims in past

Police records show the suspect told officers he took extra steps during what he called a planned sexual encounter with the 24-year-old, including driving past a potential witness so not to be seen.

Since Jansen's arrest, investigators have learned that the Atlanta woman pleaded guilty to filing a false rape report in Cherokee County and a fabricated assault report in Fannin County.

"We've talked to those authorities," Sevier Capt. Jeff McCarter said Tuesday. "It don't change our case here at this point. It still goes to court."

In 2005, the Cherokee County Sheriff's Department arrested the woman for filing a false report, said Maj. Ron Hunton, commander of Cherokee's criminal investigations. The woman, who officers found lying in the grass with her clothes cut, claimed she was raped behind a Kohl's in Woodstock, according to a police report. She later pleaded guilty to charges the report was made up, Hunton said.

Less than a year later, the woman claimed she had been stabbed by an unknown male in Fannin. The false allegation was filed after she showed up at her mother's trailer in Morganton. Her mother discovered her on the sidewalk, bloodied from a gash on her left wrist, and called 911.

"I asked [alleged victim] who did this to her?" according to the police report, filed Feb. 17, 2006. "She didn't say anything. I asked where it happened she said 'at the store.'"

The woman later admitted she wasn't attacked and, last November, pleaded guilty to falsely reporting a crime and making a false statement to a police officer.

She was fined $500 and sentenced to one year's probation, during which time she was to continue court-mandated psychological counseling.

Steven R. Hawkins, chief assistant district attorney in Sevier, said his office is reviewing the woman's prior reports but does not plan to change the case right now.

"A person that has been guilty of that before could certainly be telling the truth and be kidnapped and raped," Hawkins said Tuesday.

Hawkins said he anticipates the woman's prior convictions will be discussed at the July 17 court hearing.

"I'm sure it will come out in court," he said. "It certainly will go to her credibility. We just need to look at all the evidence and find the truth in the case."

The 24-year-old woman told Sevier investigators she was jogging in her Morningside neighborhood May 26 when she was approached by an acquaintance, tied up and kidnapped. She said she was then driven to a cabin in remote Gatlinburg, Tenn., where the suspect cut off her clothes and raped her, according to the sheriff's report.

A pizza deliveryman, who brought Jansen his dinner, alerted deputies after seeing the woman tied up. Deliveryman Chris Turner, who saw the woman's hands bound while the suspect was signing a credit card receipt, said she silently mouthed call 911.

"I said, 'Are you for real?' I didn't believe her," Turner said.

The woman rolled her eyes and again silently pleaded for Turner to call police.

Investigators said they found evidence of a crime, including rope, prescriptions pills, condoms and pieces of the woman's torn clothes, the report states.

McCarter declined to discuss evidence or other details of the investigation, including whether the woman was questioned about her criminal history.

Jansen told investigators the he and the woman were on a "romantic getaway from their spouses." He said the woman was sexually aroused by bondage, according to the sheriff's report.

He told investigators the encounter was "pre-planned" and he initially drove past the woman because an unknown man was out walking his dog when he attempted to pick her up, according to an Atlanta Police report.

The woman's husband received a call from Sevier investigators around 9 p.m., saying his wife had been abducted. He then called Atlanta Police.

According to the Atlanta Police report, the husband said he spent the day searching hospitals after his wife, who has a medical condition, never returned home from jogging.

Jansen's attorney, Don Bosch, said he is aware of the woman's past charges and convictions and a "number of other highly unusual facts surrounding these allegations."

"We are preparing a motion for filing that will address this and a number of other relevant issues related to our client's bond status and innocence," Bosch said Monday night.

The woman has not returned phone calls or e-mail. No one answered the door at the couple's home on Tuesday afternoon. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has a policy not to name alleged victims of sexual assault.

-- Christian Boone contributed to this article.