Stone Mountain man convicted, sentenced for 2020 rape, kidnapping, DA says

STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. — DeKalb County District Attorney Sherry Boston announced a Stone Mountain man was convicted of raping a woman, then kidnapping her and her mother.

Michael Tish Mingo Richard was convicted by a jury on Jan. 12 for raping one victim and then trying to kidnap her and her mother on March 6, 2020.

The DA’s office said officers from the DeKalb County Police Department responded to a call about a sexual assault in Stone Mountain around 1 p.m. the day of the incident.

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Investigators went to an apartment complex on Abberly Way, where the victim told them she came home to her apartment to find Richard outside. The two knew each other because he had previously been in a relationship with one of her friends, the DA’s office said.

Richard told the victim that he was having car trouble and asked for help, which she agreed to, but said she had to change clothes first. Richard, according to the investigators, followed her inside. When she entered the kitchen, Richard came up behind her and put a knife to her throat, then zip tied her hands, forced her into a bedroom and assaulted her.

During the sexual assault, the victim told officers that she heard her mother enter the apartment and yelled for her to run away, but Richard ran out of the bedroom and tied up the victim’s mother as well.

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Then, Richard ordered the victim to shower and change clothes, according to the DA’s office, and told them to drive to an ATM where they took money from the mother’s bank account.

Richard took the two women back to the apartment, tied up the victim’s mother, and left here there, before making the victim take him to a convenience store to buy drugs. When they again returned to the apartment, Richard tied up the victim, the DA’s office said.

He then left and came back to the apartment several times to check if the two women had gone to get help. After a final time he’d left, the two victims waited roughly 30 minutes before leaving the apartment and going to the leasing office to call 911, according to the DA’s office.

The women learned Richard had fled in their car. Law enforcement officers arrested him in Savannah the next day after a license plate reader alerted investigators that the stolen car was in the area, the DA’s office said. Richard was found with a knife and was tased after he refused to drop the weapon upon officers’ orders to do so.

In custody, Richard was taken to a local hospital, then the Chatham County Jail, according to the DA’s office. Investigators found a pad of paper in his pocket with a note “about how sorry he was for ‘the evil he brought’ on the victim.”

The DA’s Office said Richard was sentenced on Wednesday to life in prison without parole and 40 years to serve in confinement.

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