Two North Carolina men were arrested and charged in the rape and robbery of a 24-year-old Pennsylvania woman Thursday.
Evoire Collier, 21, and Dorian Taylor, 24, were arrested after security footage allegedly showed them entering Christine Englehardt’s South Beach hotel room with her. Collier and Taylor left the room an hour later. The victim was later found dead, after apparently being drugged, raped, and robbed. The two men allegedly met the victim at a restaurant, and walked back with her on Ocean Drive to the hotel.
While no cause of death has been established, authorities are trying to determine if the victim died of overdose. Police report Collier admitted he “went along with [Taylor] as they planned to have sex with the victim,” and that Taylor gave Englehardt a “green pill,” believed to be Percocet, before they reached her room.
During Monday’s bond hearing, a Miami Beach detective testified that by the time they reached the elevator, “The defendant was holding her from behind, holding her by the neck so she could stand.”
Collier reportedly claimed Taylor forced himself on Englehardt, who appeared to be unconscious. “The fact that the victim was under the influence of alcohol and narcotics, she could not have consented to sex with the defendants,” police said in the report. After both men had sex with her, police say they left with her cash, credit cards, and phone.
The pair then allegedly spent her money across Miami. Collier was apprehended on Ocean Drive, wearing the same pants as seen in the hotel security recording. Taylor was arrested at South Beach Liquors. He still had the woman’s phone and some green pills in his possession.
The suspects face charges of burglary with battery, sexual battery, petty theft, and credit card fraud. They may also face manslaughter or murder charges, pending a judgment by the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner’s Office on the victim’s cause of death. Both are being held without bond at a Miami-Dade jail.
Local authorities continue struggling to contain the unruly horde of “spring breakers” descending on Miami, and the chaos that comes with them. “These crowds are in the thousands,” Interim City Manager Raul Aguila told the Miami Herald. “We’re at capacity.” Early curfews have been set in place, and police have even resorted to pepper spray balls in efforts to clear the crowds.