An Ocklawaha man has been charged with sexual battery after he allegedly drugged, raped, burned and beat a woman in early January.
Efthimios Michael Zachary Mikedis, a convicted felon who has been in and out of prison since 2011, has been locked up in the Marion County Jail for more than three months on several charges that include a warrant for parole violation for domestic battery by strangulation.
A woman told a Marion County Sheriff’s deputy that she had been planning to move from Orange County to Ocala. A relative told her about someone she could meet and gave her the person’s social media information. The woman said she met the person, later identified as Mikedis, on Facebook and he agreed to drive her from Orlando to Ocala on Jan. 5.
On the way to Ocala, Mikedis stopped at a camper in Ocklawaha where he and another person allegedly raped her.
The woman said Mikedis burned her hair with a cigarette, physically abused and punched her. She said she was thrown into a van, driven to a grocery store parking lot off East State Road 40 and forced out of the vehicle.
Authorities are looking for Robert McDaniel in connection with the incident. Anyone with any information about McDaniel’s whereabouts can call Detective Jessica Galler at 38-35355.
Contact Austin L. Miller at 867-4118, austin.miller@starbanner.com or @almillerosb.
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