NORTHAMPTON — In court Thursday, a prosecutor said a Springfield man accused of kidnapping and raping a woman in a secluded area in South Hadley in November 2014 lured her into his car after agreeing to pay her for help on his newspaper-delivery route.
Jason Coons — who has been described by Assistant Northwestern District Attorney Jennifer Suhl as a level-2 sex offender with a lengthy record, including “numerous” prior convictions for sex offenses — has pleaded not guilty to two counts of aggravated rape and one count each of kidnapping and witness intimidation.
A grand jury indicted Coons, 37, on the charges last month, and a warrant for his arrest was issued July 27, court records show. He was originally held in lieu of $100,000 cash. In Hampshire Superior Court on Thursday, his attorney Korrina Burnham of the Committee for Public Counsel Services argued for a bail sum of $2,500.
“It may not seem like a lot of money,” Burnham argued before Hampshire Superior Court Judge Richard Carey, “but to Mr. Coons and his family, it is.”
Carey agreed to lower Coons’ bail, but not as much as Coons had hoped, going from $100,000 to $25,000.
Suhl said that Coons was on his normal newspaper-delivery route one evening in November 2014 when he stopped in at the alleged victim’s workplace in Northampton. The two talked, and Coons asked the woman if she wanted to assist him in his paper route and drive to South Hadley, Suhl said. He agreed to pay her $40.
Coons was associated at the time of the alleged assault with Publishers Circulation Fulfillment, or PFC, the independent company through which the Gazette delivers newspapers to subscribers. He worked for PCF as an independent contractor or subcontractor. He had also worked in the distribution center of the Gazette until December 2014.
Once in the car, Coons took the woman’s phone, Suhl said. “Don’t worry,” he told her, according to Suhl. “You can trust me.”
Coons drove the woman to a dark, secluded area in South Hadley and forced his hands down her pants as she protested, the prosecutor continued. The woman tried to crawl out the driver’s side door as Coons got out of the car and walked to the passenger side.
Suhl said he grabbed hold of the woman, dragged her back through the door and raped her.
After, Coons drove the woman back to the Northampton parking lot near her work where her car was and coerced her into calling his cell phone four times, leaving voicemails about how the sex was consensual, the prosecutor said.
The woman reported the attack six months later, according to Burnham, who contends that Coons and the woman were acquaintances.
Michael Majchrowicz can be reached at mmajchrowicz@gazettenet.com.