A 49-year-old man has been sentenced to between 15 and 23 years in prison for the September 2023 rape and robbery of a 77-year-old woman shortly after she opened her store on Reynolda Road on a Sunday.

Bryon Shane Martin pleaded guilty to first-degree kidnapping and second-degree forcible rape for what prosecutors called a “brutal attack” – less than a month after he’d been released from prison.

Police said Martin threatened the woman with a hammer and forced her to have intercourse in the store, across from Hanes Park. Officers arrested him less than two hours later on nearby Canal Street with the help of a K9 team.

The victim and nearby shoppers identified Martin as the suspect.

He already had a criminal record spanning more than three decades and had been released from the Piedmont

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