A lengthy prison sentence awaits a longtime violent felon who cut through the screen of a north Minneapolis woman's unlocked bedroom window as she slept on a late-spring night last year and sexually assaulted her at knife point.
Nathan D. Jones, 42, of Minneapolis, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Hennepin County District Court to first-degree criminal sexual conduct. Jones is expected to be given a 30-year sentence with at least the first two-thirds to be served in prison before supervised release.
Jones said during his plea hearing that he was high during the attack on alcohol, ecstasy, Xanax, embalming fluid and marijuana and does not recall the assault on the woman, whom he did not know.
According to the criminal complaint, Jones woke up the woman and forced her to perform oral sex on him as he held a knife and partly covered his face with a towel.
Jones later wiped his face with the towel, which police recovered from the kitchen garbage. Also recovered at the residence in the 1600 block of Fremont Avenue N. was semen found on a sock.
Authorities ultimately determined that Jones' DNA matched what was on the towel and sock.
His sentence in 2009 for third-degree attempted assault required that he submit a DNA sample for filing with the state.
Jones' criminal history in Minnesota spans his entire adulthood. His convictions range from auto theft to drug offenses to assault to first-degree criminal sexual conduct.
