News

Accused rapist fires attorneys and begins representing himself

David B. Pressley sits with his defense team in Henderson County Superior Court earlier this week. Pressley fired his attorneys on Wednesday

By Amy McCraw, Published: November 16, 2023

Saying they were “in my way” and he did not “need them on my side anymore,” a twice convicted sexual offender standing trial this week in Henderson County Superior Court on Wednesday fired his attorneys and began representing himself on charges he broke into a home in 2022 and raped the young woman who lived there with her father.

The decision by 56-year-old David B. Pressley, of Fletcher, to represent himself also led to an unusual set of circumstances that forced a woman Pressley raped in 1993 to face cross examination from the man who raped her.
She testified shortly before the state rested its case against Pressley.
The woman, who is now 55 years old, told the jury she was at home in Hendersonville and taking care of her children in May 1993 when a friend asked her to walk with Pressley to a location in town where his car was located. She was going to drive the car for him because he did not have a license.
Pressley suggested they take a shortcut through the woods as they walked, she testified. Once in the woods Pressley shoved her into a wellhouse.
“I started screaming,” the woman said.
Pressley then beat her in the face and over other parts of her body with his fists. He also covered her mouth with his hands and raped her.
“I just didn’t look like me afterwards,” she testified. “All I could do was cry. I couldn’t stop crying.”
The woman said Pressley told her he was sorry after he assaulted her.
She eventually returned home and reported the incident to law enforcement.
When he began to cross examine the woman on Wednesday, Pressley said, he was “sorry she had to relive that day again.”
He then asked if she remembered what happened and if she lost consciousness. She said she did remember and did not lose consciousness.
Pressley was convicted of raping the woman in 1995 and sentenced to 20 years in prison. He was released in 2001 before being arrested and convicted of raping another woman in 2002. He was again released from prison in 2017, according to testimony from a probation officer that was heard when the jury was not in the courtroom.
The jury on Wednesday also heard testimony from a probation officer and a Henderson County Sheriff’s Office detective who investigated the 2022 case involving Pressley.
The probation officer testified he took Pressley’s cell phone in December 2021 after finding more than one search for rape videos.
Sheriff’s Detective Scott Aly said he obtained a search warrant for the phone after he began investigating the case a month later in January 2022. Aly said he discovered search terms on the phone that included rape, teenage sex and inflicting pain through sex.
Pressley was charged in January 2022 with raping a young woman who had just turned 18 years old when she was alone in her home off Howard Gap Road while her father was at work.
She told the jury Pressley had visited earlier in the day and left with her father when he went to work that night. Pressley, who was an acquaintance of her father, returned to the home later that night and knocked on the door. He said he had left some items on their couch.
She testified she did not remember what happened after turning to look at the couch.
But when her father returned later to check on her, she was suffering from physical injuries, including two broken toes, bruises across her body and redness on her neck. She also felt soreness and bleeding that indicated she had been raped.
In testimony before he fired his attorneys on Wednesday, an emergency room doctor at Pardee Hospital who treated the girl’s physical injuries said those injuries were consistent with an assault.
“I felt confident she was assaulted,” Dr. Timothy Novak testified. “It doesn’t seem compatible with a fall or accident.”
A urine test also ruled out drugs as a possible cause of her memory loss, he said.
A chocking injury could possibly cause a lack of oxygen to her brain and cause memory loss, he testified under questioning from Donna Rainwater, a special prosecutor from the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys, who is trying the case for the state.
Paramedics and deputies who first responded to a 911 call from the girl’s father testified they saw redness around her throat. But under cross examination from Pressley’s attorney, Novak said he did not see injuries to her throat when he examined her several hours later in the hospital emergency room.
A DNA expert from the state’s crime lab in Edneyville also testified Wednesday that vaginal and anal samples taken during the girl’s stay in the hospital also confirmed the presence of Pressley’s sperm and his DNA in the girl’s body to within octillions of a possibility that it could have been anyone else on Earth. Pressley is charged in indictments with first-degree forcible rape, first-degree forcible sexual offense, first-degree burglary and larceny after breaking and entering in the case.
Another indictment also charges Pressley with being a violent habitual felon. The indictment lists Pressley’s 1995 conviction of second-degree sexual offense in the incident that occurred in Henderson County in 1993. He was also convicted of second-degree rape in 2002 in an incident that occurred in the county earlier that year.
Pressley told Superior Court Judge George Bell of Mecklenburg County that he wanted to fire his attorneys as soon as he entered the courtroom after a lunch break on Wednesday.
The jury had not yet returned to the courtroom from the break to begin hearing testimony.
“I release my counsel,” Pressley told the judge.
Bell allowed Pressley to begin serving as his own attorney after the judge researched the proper procedures for doing so.
“Give me a minute here,” Bell said. “This has never come up in my experience in five years. I need some time.”
Bell eventually allowed Pressley to sign a waiver of his right to an attorney after determining his competence and advising him of what he would be expected to do as his own attorney.
The judge also told Pressley he would not be given special treatment and told him the charges he faces mean he could spend the rest of his life in prison if he is convicted.
“These charges are very serious,” Bell said, noting that only first-degree murder is a more serious offense.
Over Pressley’s objections, Bell also appointed the attorneys he had just fired to serve as his standby counsel to assist him in certain circumstances.
Rainwater objected often and the judge confirmed those objections when Pressley began representing himself.
Bell also spent time explaining to Pressley the rules involving his right to present evidence in his case.
“It’s not like Law & Order,” Pressley said at one point in reference to the popular television show.
Rainwater rested the state’s case late Wednesday. Pressley is expected to begin his defense on Thursday.