MONROE COUNTY, Pa. — The ordeal started Monday night.
Davaun Jackson and Isaiah Rogers-Keeney ordered two women — witnesses to a recent shooting in Wilkes-Barre — to get into their Ford SUV, according to newly filed charging documents. Two other women were already inside.
State police in Monroe County say Jackson and Rogers-Keeney held the women in shipping containers at a former airfield just outside of East Stroudsburg. There, authorities allege, Jackson raped two of the women and threatened death and dismemberment.
Magisterial District Judge Phillip R. Riley arraigned Jackson, 29, and Rogers-Keeney, 19, Wednesday morning and denied them bail, citing the “extremely violent” offenses. They face charges including kidnapping and rape. Rogers-Keeney is charged as an accomplice.
“It's terrible that something like that could happen and that many girls getting kidnapped, it's terrible,” said Harold Barnes, of Marshalls Creek.
State police ended up catching them when a friend of the victims spotted them Tuesday at a Walmart in Mount Pocono.
Once the women were safe, they disclosed to state police what happened. Their names have not been released. A 17-year-old girl was the youngest of the victims.
Two of the victims told investigators they saw a shooting happen in Wilkes-Barre. The shooter went by the name “Shake.”
Not long after, Jackson, who is an associate of one of the women, met with the two women and ordered them into his SUV, A Ford Flex. Rogers-Keeney was behind the wheel. Two other women sat in passenger seats.
Once they were inside, the SUV rumbled off. One of the women grew worried that things were getting dangerous and reached out to a friend for help.
She tried to jump from the moving vehicle, but Jackson put her in a headlock and took their cell phones. There would be no more calls for help. At least, not yet.
Their destination was an office property at the former Stroudsburg Airport. Jackson bound three of the women with rope.
The fourth was not tied because she already had four-points on Jackson’s five-point system. If she tried anything, she would die, she told investigators.
The victims were made to strip. Jackson said he would flip a coin to determine the next steps. Heads, rape. Tails, dismemberment. Jackson had a chainsaw, axe and sledgehammer, state police said. There was some discussion that one person be sacrificed.
“Do you want one person to suffer, or do you want everyone to suffer?" Jackson asked one of the victims.
In the end, Jackson raped two of the women, state police charged. The women were put in nearby shipping containers until morning.
As Tuesday dawned, Jackson and Rogers-Keeney drove the women to another property in Pen Argyl. Two of the victims were given their cell phones back with strict warnings against breathing a word of what happened. If they told anyone, they would die.
Despite that, one of the victims reached out to another woman. That act precipitated a 911 call and the arrest of Jackson and Rogers-Keeney.
In custody, Jackson told state police the sex was consensual, and the threats had been a scare tactic.
Preliminary hearings are tentatively scheduled for July 10.
Jackson does not have an attorney, according to court records. Newswatch 16 reached out to the attorney listed for Rogers-Keeney, Gail Marr, and received a response with the statement saying: "The only statement I will make right now is that I have spoken with my client and that he maintains his innocence in this case."
Kristoff Johnson, owner of a business near where the women were held, watched as police searched the property.
The news of what happened, he said, hit close to home.
"I have two of my daughters, three of my daughters when school is out, here full time," Johnson said. "They go right to the pavilion right there, and they hang out, which is literally opposite the (headquarters) where it happened, so it's trembling. It honestly is."
“I don't even have the words to really put to it other than that is absolutely insane,” Johnson continued.