A Fugitive in France May Face the End of His Flight

Nov. 28, 2006 — -- When Nancy Horn was raped 29 years ago, gasoline cost 64 cents a gallon and a movie ticket a little more than $2.

Since then, a lot has changed, but one thing has stayed the same: Horn is still fighting for justice, waiting for her attacker to be punished.

That accused attacker, Jean Paul Ayers, was found guilty in a Cuyahoga County, Ohio, courtroom of raping Horn in 1978.

Once released on bond, Ayers took advantage of a legal birthright and fled to France, a country which does not extradite its citizens to face prosecution for crimes committed abroad.

Ayers was protected under France's laws because his mother is French and he holds dual citizenship from both the United States and France.

In France, Ayers set up a comfortable new life under an assumed name, started a family, and took on a succession of corporate jobs.

Today, Horn has her day in court -- just not in the court or country she expected. Nearly 4,000 miles from home, Horn will testify in a courthouse near Paris.

After several failed attempts at extradition, at least $50,000 of taxpayer money in court costs, and a ruling from the French Supreme Court, a French investigating judge will consider American testimony and decide whether Ayers should face trial in France.

It was December 1977, and Horn was a young flight attendant unloading Christmas presents from her car, holding open the door to her apartment.

A man sneaked into the unlocked home, she says, hiding until he had a chance to attack her with a screwdriver and violently rape her.

In a 1996 interview, Horn described that night to ABC News.

"I walked in. I put my things down on the coach, turned around to get my mail," she said.

Next thing she knew, Horn said, she was being attacked.

"It was dark. And there he was to knock her down, attack her, threaten her life with a screwdriver to her throat and ripped her clothes off her and rape her," said Jim Burger, a detective with the Fairview Police Department in Ohio who investigated the incident.