Arrest Made in Armed Rape, Robbery

A 28-year-old St. Petersburg man is behind bars, charged in a brutal Dec. 29 attack on a woman.

According to the St. Petersburg Police Department, the attack occurred around 6:44 a.m. in the area of 54th Avenue North and 28th Street North. The woman told police she encountered a man there who was armed with a gun.

While she tried to run, the man grabbed her and struck her with the gun, fracturing her jaw on both sides of her face. When the woman fell to the ground, the man sexually assaulted her, police said in an email to media. The man then took her cell phone, car keys and fled in the woman’s vehicle, police said.

After the attack, the woman called 911. She later told police she did not recognize her attacker.

Leandre Snead of 790 16th Ave. S. was charged in the crime Wednesday after police received a positive DNA match, the email said. He was arrested at 4 p.m. at 525 Mirror Lake, which is a Florida Department of Corrections Probation Office.

Snead now faces sexual battery with a deadly weapon and grand theft motor vehicle charges. Snead was being held in the Pinellas County Jail Thursday without bond. He has a lengthy criminal record, jail records indicate, with past charges including robbery, trafficking in stolen property, possession of drugs and battery charges.

Photo credit: Leandre Snead/Pinellas County Jail