Records detail brutal rape attack

Published 4:00 am Tuesday, March 1, 2011

The man accused of the violent and prolonged attack on a 23-year-old Bend woman allegedly raped his victim, then stopped to eat a bowl of cereal before sexually assaulting her again.

Court records describe this and other brutal details of the Friday night assault that allegedly occurred in the suspect’s Franklin Crossing apartment about a week after he found the woman through the online dating site Match.com.

According to court records:

Thomas Harry Bray, 37, was charged Monday with two counts each of rape and sodomy, along with strangulation and fourth-degree assault. He was scheduled to be arraigned Monday, but that proceeding was delayed because he had been released from Deschutes County Jail after posting 10 percent of his $407,500 bail.

Bray, a licensed physician, was recently hired as a part-time instructor at Central Oregon Community College. He taught one class on anatomy. According to COCC officials, he was in class the Saturday after the incident and has since been placed on administrative leave.

Bray was arrested at his home Saturday. A search warrant chronicles the traumatic experience of a woman who believed she was meeting a doctor for a cocktail and then later feared her life might be in danger.

The woman told police she and Bray met at Tart, a downtown bar on the corner of Minnesota Avenue and Bond Street, about a block from his apartment.

The woman had one drink — a lemon drop martini — before Bray invited her back to his home. There, Bray opened a bottle of white wine he had taken from his car and began pouring drinks for the two of them.

He continued to urge the woman to drink and had started pouring some of his own wine into her glass. She also noticed he had switched their glasses earlier in the evening.

After two glasses of wine, the woman told police she began feeling “fuzzy” and felt “very drunk.” Her next memory is of Bray throwing her onto his bed and ripping off her clothes.

It was on the bed where the 6-foot, 185-pound Bray began holding the woman down and choking her until she lost consciousness. She told the investigating officers she didn’t think she was awake the whole time.

Bray then began having sex with the woman, hitting her in the head and spitting in her face while he called her “stupid” and “whore,” she recalled to authorities.

When he was done, he put on a robe and went to his kitchen for a bowl of cereal. The woman’s cell phone and car keys were on the kitchen counter, and she told police she was afraid to leave because she believed Bray would kill her if she tried.

While Bray was eating his cereal, he began making fun of the woman, and asked her if she wanted him to invite a neighbor over so they could have a “three way.” The name calling continued.

“Are you going to call me after this?” he asked.

The documents go on to say she told investigators that once he was done with his cereal, Bray went back to the bed where she was, grabbed her by the hair and tried forcing her to drink more wine. A clump of her hair was ripped out.

He forced her to commit more sexual acts, she told police, while he continued to strike her in the head and face. Bray then raped her again. When done, he made her use a bath towel to clean up, and then ordered her to make his bed while he watched.

After Bray fell asleep, the woman told police she gathered her belongings and was heading out of his house when Bray stopped her to ask what she was doing.

She told him that he hurt her, at which point he apologized and said, “I probably owe you a shirt. You can borrow one if you want.”

The woman didn’t call the police until the following morning after she sent a text message to a friend saying she might have been raped, the documents state. It was her friend who urged her to do so, and when the woman saw Bray’s smiling photo in a police lineup she began to cry.

Police collected a number of items from Bray’s apartment, including lubricant and black duct tape from a bedside table, wine glasses, CDs, a computer and several bottles of prescription medication.

The prescription pills included medication for pain relief, like Tramadol and Roxicodone; antibiotics used to treat bacterial infections; the anti-anxiety drug Lorazepam; and the antidepressant Brupopion, which can also be used to help quit smoking. A couple of pill bottles had different names on them, including John Bray and Robert Bray. At least one had a woman’s name on it.

Police also collected DNA, blood and pubic hair samples from Bray.

The woman was treated at St. Charles Bend for non-life-threatening injuries. In a police report, a nurse told authorities that it seemed like the woman had to be “hit and slapped a lot” and had developed redness and bruising on her face, neck and shoulder, along with other injuries.

According to information contained in the search warrant, Bray had what was described as a “minimal” criminal history that includes arrests in California in 1993 and 1994 for forgery and threatening a crime with the intent to terrorize.

National Crime Information Center records also show that Bray was under a protection order and was supposed to avoid contact with a California woman and any children she might have. Those documents also state he is not allowed to possess a firearm under federal law.

Bray’s application to COCC shows he went to high school in Ojai, Calif. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley, with a major in Spanish language and literature. He went to medical school at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, and performed his residency at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. He specialized in anesthesiology.

Bray could not be reached for comment. A cell phone he was using as recently as Friday was disconnected, and an attempt to reach him at his Franklin Crossing apartment was unsuccessful.

Authorities are asking that anyone who has had suspicious encounters with Bray to report them by calling Bend Police at 541-322-2960 or the Deschutes County 911 nonemergency line at 541-693-6911.

Marketplace