RAPE CHARGE DISMISSED

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 8, 1993                   TAG: 9304080208
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium
RAPE CHARGE DISMISSED
A rape charge against a star football player at Chesterfield County's L.C. Bird High School was dropped Wednesday when the woman who brought the charge failed to appear at a preliminary hearing.
Jason Vineyard was accused of raping the 19-year-old woman in his friend's dormitory room at Virginia Tech in January. The woman from Northern Virginia was visiting friends on the campus and was not a student.
Skip Schwab, an assistant commonwealth's attorney for Montgomery County, asked General District Judge Thomas Frith to drop the charge because the woman was not there to testify. Schwab had planned to ask the judge to send the case against Vineyard to a grand jury meeting in July.
Schwab said he wasn't surprised the woman declined to appear because she had indicated last month that she had changed her mind about pressing charges. Vineyard was arrested after the woman called Virginia Tech police.
"We had to put on evidence today, and she didn't come," Schwab said. "I don't know why. We could bring the charge back up, but we would have to have an indication she would go forward."
Vineyard was Bird's all-time leading rusher, an all-Group AAA selection and Richmond Times-Dispatch co-player of the year.
Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker has said Vineyard was not on campus for an official recruiting visit.
Vineyard's attorney, Joe Painter of Blacksburg, said he was confident the charge would have been dropped even if the woman had testified.
"There wasn't a case there," Painter said. "All the acts were consensual. She got into an argument because she couldn't get a ride home and then raised the specter of rape. I think it's fair to say he was falsely charged."
Painter said Vineyard dropped out of regular classes and began receiving instruction in the school's homebound program because of "all the talk about him going around."

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB