John Jefferson
Left to right: Daquain R. Livingston, Elijah Nil Curney, Dashawn Andrettie Harris (Gwinnett County Police).
Three men in Georgia are heading to prison for raping a woman at gunpoint — and forcing her boyfriend to watch — before robbing the couple.
A jury in Gwinnett County on Friday found Daquain R. Livingston, 21, Elijah Nil Curney, 20, and Dashawn Andrettie Harris, 18, guilty on counts of rape, aggravated sodomy, and armed robbery over the 2021 attack, authorities announced.
Curney was also convicted of being in possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.
“This is a despicable crime that absolutely could not go unchecked,” Gwinnett County District Attorney Patsy Austin-Gatson said in a statement following the verdict. “The trauma these defendants inflicted on the victims is unimaginable and these three men deserve to be punished to fullest extent of the law.”
According to a news release from the county district attorney’s office, the horrific attack took place on July 21, 2021, in the parking lot of The Falls at Gwinnett Place apartment complex.
Authorities say that at about 2 a.m. on the morning of the attack, Curney, Harris, Livingston, and a “previously convicted defendant” approached the victims in the parking lot where their cars were parked next to each other.
“The defendants pointed guns at the couple and assaulted the woman while holding a firearm on the male victim and forcing him to watch the attack,” prosecutors wrote in the release. “At some point, one of the defendants threatened to ‘blow her brains out’ if the female victim in any way retaliated during the assault. After the attack, the defendants took items from both victims’ cars and walked away, as the victims fled the scene on foot and in different directions.”
Both victims subsequently called 911 to report the assault and robbery. Police confirmed that several other cars in the area had been broken into and robbed, and one person had reported that a handgun had been taken from their vehicle.
Investigators said that based on descriptions of the attackers — specifically, the contrast between Curney, who stood 5 feet, 4 inches tall, and Livingston, who was over 6 feet and wearing red jogging pants — they were able to find Ring doorbell footage of the group just prior to the attack.
Additionally, DNA recovered from a rape kit was matched to Curney and fingerprints found inside of the victims’ vehicles were a match for Harris, prosecutors said.
About a month after the attack, Curney was the passenger in a vehicle that was stopped and searched. Inside of the stopped vehicle, police recovered the gun that was stolen from a car in the area of the attack.
“Investigators questioned Curney, who matched video surveillance from the July 21 incident,” the release states. “He admitted being present during the rape and partially identified his co-defendants. When police searched his phone, they found frequent contacts and social media posts with Harris.”
All three men will appear in court again on Oct. 28 for their sentencing hearing.
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