Kidnapping suspect caught
After spending more than a month on the lam, state police have captured a South Union Township man accused of kidnapping a Fairchance woman at gunpoint and raping her. State police Trooper John F. Marshall said Howard Leslie Layhue, 34, was charged early Wednesday with kidnapping, rape, terroristic threats, unlawful restraint, possession of prohibited weapons, recklessly endangering another person, criminal mischief and possession of a controlled substance.
State police Cpl. Chuck Frey said Layhue was taken into custody early Wednesday in Fairchance after police received a tip on his location.
“We have a bunch of young, aggressive troopers working midnight shift and they responded to the location in search of Layhue, at which point he fled the residence he was hiding in into a wooded area,” Frey said. “Police gave chase and eventually he was taken into custody.”
The charges were filed against Layhue after an incident at 8:54 a.m. Oct. 2 when the woman was dropping her child off at school in Fairchance.
Layhue allegedly smashed the window of the woman’s car with the stock of a shotgun and dragged her from the vehicle to his own and then fled the scene, Frey said.
Frey said Layhue then drove the woman to a campsite off Quebec Run Road in Wharton Township, where he continued to hold her against her will and forced her to have sex with him at gunpoint.
Frey said officers were able to locate Layhue’s vehicle off Quebec Run Road and immediately set up a perimeter around the wooded area.
He said that as police approached the location where they believed Layhue was hiding, troopers spotted him at a distance, where he dropped a sawed-off shotgun and ran into a heavily wooded area.
Frey said police seized the gun and found the woman, clothed in her pajamas, nearby.
Frey said more than a dozen troopers continued to pursue Layhue on foot while a state police helicopter provided aerial support.
He said the search was eventually called off because of the thick brush.
The woman was taken to the Uniontown Hospital for treatment of minor injuries.
The Herald-Standard does not identify the victims of alleged sexual assault.
The incident is not Layhue’s first run-in with the law.
In 2006, he pleaded guilty to unlawful restraint, terroristic threats, simple assault and reckless endangerment. Those charges were filed after he broke into his mother-in-law’s home, took off his pants and then held her at gunpoint.
At that time, police said that Layhue had just separated from his wife a few weeks before.
He was sentenced to 23 months intermediate punishment in a plea agreement reached with prosecutors, who dismissed charges of burglary and aggravated assault.
Police said he broke into his mother-in-law’s house through a basement window, went into her bedroom and threatened to kill her. Police said he intended to tape her hands behind her back, but the woman was able to talk him out of it.
Layhue also was wanted for allegedly violating a protection-from-abuse order against him in Fayette County Court on two occasions in September.
He was placed in the Fayette County Prison following his arraignment Wednesday.
A preliminary hearing will be held at a later date before Magisterial District Judge Randy S. Abraham.