Karl Etters

Democrat staff writer

A homeless man is behind bars after investigators say he kidnapped a Tallahassee woman and subjected her to a two-day drug binge that included rape, manic psychotic episodes and threats of violence.

William Ahrens drove his red Toyota Tundra from Silver Lake on Blountstown Highway to truck stops in Midway and out to Monticello between Feb. 8 and Friday.

In the passenger seat sat a mother who lived with her children in transitional housing in west Tallahassee.

She told Leon County Sheriff’s Office investigators that Ahrens, 48, kidnapped her after taking her to run errands, forced her to smoke methamphetamine and sexually battered her over the course of two days.

Ahrens was arrested Saturday and is being held without bond. He is charged with two counts of sexual assault, one count of sexual battery by coercing the victim with threats of violence and kidnapping.

The woman, who is not being identified because she is a victim of a sex crime, met Ahrens near Messer Park several weeks before she asked him on Feb.8 to take her to run errands at Walmart.

After leaving the store, the woman noticed Ahrens was not driving her back home as he headed west of town to the Silver Lake Recreation Area.

Ahrens repeatedly said they were “going fishing,” which the woman told investigators worried her.

At the lake, LCSO said, Ahrens forcibly had sex with the woman. She said she was scared because of a large, fixed blade knife sitting on the ground nearby.

Afterward, Ahrens pulled out a glass pipe and started smoking meth. He pushed the pipe into the woman’s mouth, court records say, telling her he would hurt her if she didn’t inhale.

Ahrens began talking to imaginary people. As the woman used her phone to check her heart rate, he took it from her saying it was possessed, records say.

The duo left the lake for the Flying J truck stop in Midway where Ahrens smoked more meth and forced the woman to keep smoking it too. When a Midway Police Department patrol car pulled up behind Ahrens’ truck, he held the woman’s leg and the door lock switch to prevent her from escaping.

As they left the truck stop, Ahrens became “manic,” the woman told deputies. He accused her of being a shapeshifter and talked about his truck being possessed.

Court records say Ahrens drove to another Gadsden County truck stop, the Miccosukee community, out to Monticello, the Walmart on North Thomasville Road and throughout rural parts of Leon County before heading back on Blountstown Highway to a campsite on the south shore of Lake Talquin.

The woman told investigators the rural route and his “twitchy” nature made her nervous Ahrens was planning to kill her.

They stayed at what investigators later described as a boat landing until around sunrise Friday when Ahrens forced the woman to take the stimulant Adderall, while also taking as many as a dozen of the pills himself, court records said.

Ahrens took her back home where they sat in his vehicle for 30 minutes before the woman seized the chance to flee the vehicle and run. She got her kids to school, court records said, and later called police.

On Saturday, LCSO detectives located Ahrens’ truck at Silver Lake and detained him for questioning. He exhibited similar manic behavior and gave a similar account of what happened with the woman only he described it as if the two had a consensual relationship.

Contact Karl Etters at ketters@tallahassee.com or @KarlEtters on Twitter.