Man convicted of two Sacramento County rapes using DNA evidence, district attorney says

A man was convicted of two rapes, one involving an underage victim, on Thursday by a Sacramento County jury due to DNA evidence, according to prosecutors.

In a news release, the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office said that Hawthorne McGee, 59, was convicted on two counts of rape and one count of oral copulation by force.

Prosecutors said that the first rape was in Sacramento County in June 2006, when a 14-year-old girl saw her friend driving around with McGee. She joined her friend, and went back to McGee’s house, where he then told the friend to leave.

McGee “forcefully and brutally” raped the girl in the living room for an hour, according to the District Attorney’s Office. His girlfriend was present in a bedroom and could hear the girl crying and telling McGee that she was underage. The girlfriend drove the victim away from McGee’s house, prosecutors said.

The second count of rape stemmed from an incident in November 2009, when a woman was waiting at a light rail station and was approached by McGee.

Prosecutors said that McGee persuaded her to have pizza with him at a motel, but she insisted to him that she was not interested in sex and only wanted to talk. Once inside the motel, McGee punched her multiple times and strangled her as he began to rape her, according to the District Attorney’s Office.

The woman passed out and woke up hours later covered in injuries.

In both assaults, DNA evidence was collected during evidentiary examinations, which led to a match for McGee in the federal Combined DNA Index System, known as CODIS, a database of DNA profiles known to law enforcement.

The DNA evidence led to McGee’s warrant arrest by the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office on Dec. 10, 2019, according to county jail records.

Sacramento County court records show that McGee pleaded not guilty to all three charges. Records also show a series of criminal court cases in the county involving McGee, dating to at least 1994. The District Attorney’s Office said that he has previously been convicted of domestic violence, gun possession violations, driving while intoxicated and reckless driving.

McGee faces a maximum sentence of 45 years to life in prison. His sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 20 and he is currently being held at the Rio Cosumnes Correctional Center in Elk Grove.