MEMPHIS, Tenn. — UPDATED: An East Memphis man Friday convicted in a 2014 rape who went on the run for nearly four years after first pleading guilty has been sentenced to 37 years in prison without parole.
The Shelby County District Attorney’s Office said Kelvin Montgomery was convicted in April on charges of aggravated sexual battery and especially aggravated kidnapping. Tuesday, July 26, 2022, Judge Paula Skahan sentenced Montgomery to consecutive terms of 25 years for especially aggravated kidnapping and 12 years for aggravated sexual battery.
Investigators said Montgomery, 55, met the 35-year-old victim on June 15, 2014, at an East Memphis restaurant where she worked. They said she agreed to have a drink with him, but when they went to his home, he handcuffed, gagged, and choked her before raping her. The victim told police she pretended to be unconscious and she escaped to a neighbor for help when he fell asleep.
Montgomery was arrested five days after the rape, then freed on $100,000 bond. The D.A. said Montgomery pleaded guilty to a series of charges and was sentenced to 12 years. But the D.A. said a judge gave him 30 days before he had to surrender and begin his incarceration, and that’s when Montgomery took off.
The D.A. said Montgomery was found living on a sailboat in Orange Beach, Alabama in June 2017 under a fake name when an Arkansas woman who was with him was reported missing by her family. She told investigators Montgomery made her use a fake name, abused her, and would not let her leave, but would not file charges against him because she was afraid of retaliation.
Montgomery pled guilty in 2018 to a gun charge in Alabama and was then extradited back to Shelby County to face the charges in the 2014 case.
