Crime & Safety
Teen Kidnapped, Raped At Gunpoint In Berkeley: Man Convicted
The conviction comes 16 years after the teen was kidnapped near Berkeley High School.
BERKELEY, CA — A man who kidnapped and sexually assaulted a teenage girl in Berkeley in 2008 was convicted Monday by an Alameda County jury of kidnapping to commit a sex crime and other charges, the District Attorney's Office said.
Keith Asberry, Jr. is facing life in prison for the conviction, along with a conviction for a 2015 first-degree burglary and assault, according to prosecutors.
In 2008, Asberry approached a teenage girl on Allston Way near Berkeley High School as she was getting into her car. He used a gun to force her to drive to a dead-end street in west Berkeley, where he sexually assaulted her. He then forced the girl to use her ATM card to withdraw $200 from her account.
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In 2015, Asberry walked into the Berkeley home of a victim after she finished unloading her car from a shopping trip. According to prosecutors, a short, violent struggle occurred and he fled out the front door.
The jury found Asberry guilty of kidnapping to commit a sex crime, kidnapping to commit robbery, forcible penetration, aggravated kidnapping with tying and binding, forcible copulation, and forcible rape, all with the use of a firearm. He was also found guilty of first-degree burglary and misdemeanor assault.
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Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price said in a release sent out Monday that justice was delayed in this case because the rape kit was not tested until 2014.
"It is clear that if the rape kit was tested immediately, Mr. Asberry would have been identified as the alleged attacker in that case because of a felony gun conviction from 2005."
In 2013, then District Attorney Nancy O'Malley began identifying all untested sexual assault kits in Alameda County and discovered a countywide backlog of nearly 1,900 kits.
Asberry is scheduled to be sentenced on May 24.
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