LOGAN COUNTY — The statute of limitations has run out for a Logan County man convicted of attempted aggravated murder, according to Dan Trevas with Court News Ohio.
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Ralph Bortree, 55, of Logan County, was charged with the kidnapping, rape and attempted murder of Anita Clark in 1993, Trevas said. Clark was 19-years-old at the time of the incident.
The Supreme Court of Ohio vacated the attempted aggravated murder conviction, finding the statute of limitations to charge Bortree ran out 20 years before he was indicted, Trevas said.
“Under the particularly heinous set of facts in this case, the six-year statute of limitations that applies to attempted aggravated murder and attempted murder works a grave injustice,” Justice Michael P. Donnelly stated in the Court’s Majority Opinion according to Trevas. “However, we have no authority to rewrite the statute.”
On July 31, 1993, Anita Clark was driving to work in Logan County when she was forced off the road.
A man brandishing a handgun got out of his vehicle and ordered Clark into his car.
Bortree drove Clark to a remote part of Logan County where authorities said he raped her, kicked her repeatedly, cut her throat and left her in a ditch.
Clark survived the attack and Portree was charged with attempted aggravated murder rather than aggravated murder, Trevas said.
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An aggravated murder charge has no statute of limitations, unlike an attempted aggravated murder charge of six years, Trevas reported.
At the time, detectives were unable to develop a suspect.
It wasn’t until 2015 when Logan County Detective, Phil Bailey, reviewed the cold case and submitted items with DNA evidence to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Identification.
A potential suspect’s profile was created, but the DNA didn’t match anyone in any criminal database.
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In 2019, the potential suspect’s DNA profile was submitted to a private forensic genealogy company, AdvanceDNA.
AdvanceDNA provided a lead in the form of names of a family line in Logan County, which led detectives to Ralph Bortree.
DNA collected from Bortree’s cigarette butt confirmed that he was a match for the 1993 cold case, and three other cases as well.