YOUNGSTOWN — In May 2022, the same month Rondell L. Harris raped a female Mahoning County Sheriff’s deputy while he was an inmate in the Mahoning County jail, he admitted to killing a man in 2016 in Akron.

Harris, 36, went on trial this week in Summit County Common Pleas Court, charged with murder, a gun specification, aggravated robbery and being a felon in possession of a firearm in the March 8, 2016, murder of Damon Harris Jr., 24.

Rondell Harris was indicted in the murder Aug. 30, 2023.

But abruptly on Wednesday, before Rondell Harris’ trial was over, he pleaded guilty to his charges and is now set for sentencing at 9 a.m. Monday.

A Summit County Prosecutor’s Office press release states that Rondell Harris, then 27, went to a barbershop on Copley Road in Akron with the intent of committing a robbery. While surveying the area, Harris saw Damon Harris Jr. outside and targeted him instead.

After luring Damon Harris to his vehicle, Rondell Harris tried to rob him at gunpoint. When Damon Harris tried to flee, Rondell Harris shot him once in the back with a shotgun.

The case went cold until Rondell Harris admitted to the killing in 2022, while in custody on unrelated charges, Summit County Prosecutor Elliot Kolkovich stated in the press release.

In a follow-up email with the Summit County Prosecutor’s Office Thursday, Deputy Chief Counsel Rick Raley said Rondell Harris made his initial admission in May 2022.

Rondell Harris cited details that only someone involved in the crime would have known, the release states. Rondell Harris later wrote multiple letters to Summit County prosecutors, Summit County Common Pleas Court judges and the Akron Police Department in which he admitted to the killing, the release states.

Kolkovich stated that he hopes Rondell Harris’ convictions and sentence will bring peace and closure to Damon Harris Jr.’s family. “For too long, Rondell Harris walked free, while Damon’s family grieved the loss of him,” Kolkovich said.

In May 2023, Rondell Harris, then 34, from East Cleveland, pleaded guilty to the deputy’s rape and kidnapping, plus tampering with evidence and disrupting public services in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court and was sentenced the same day to 26 to 31 1/2 years in prison.

The rape victim was working as a housing officer in the Mahoning County jail May 5, 2022, while Harris was an inmate there with charges pending in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

The pending charges were disrupting public service and vandalism that occurred in January 2022. Harris himself told authorities at a hearing in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in June 2022 that the disrupting public services and vandalism charges were from his time in the Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown.

Harris pleaded guilty to disrupting public services in December 2022 in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court and was told that his 19-month prison sentence would run at the same time as whatever sentence he got for the rape, according to Vindicator files.

Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction documents indicated that Harris was serving a one-year sentence for carrying a concealed weapon out of Portage County Common Pleas Court at the time he was moved to the Mahoning County jail on the rape charge.

The rape victim later filed a lawsuit in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in which she stated that she was guarding Harris in the jail’s medical unit the day of the rape.

“After Harris returned from his daily hygiene and shower routine, he refused to provide (the female deputy) with his food tray and hair clippers, forcing her to approach his cell to collect the items,” the lawsuit stated.

“As she grasped the food tray that inmate Harris was handing back to her, Harris grabbed (the female deputy), threw her radio in the corridor and pulled her into his cell,” the suit stated. She fought Harris for four minutes, “but she was unable to hold him off,” the suit stated.

An Ohio Attorney General’s press release after Rondell Harris was sentenced in the rape case stated that Harris “pulled the deputy into a cell, and assaulted, strangled and raped her.”

Harris was moved from the Mahoning County jail after the rape to the Trumbull County jail, where he remained until May 17, 2022, according to Trumbull County jail records. At a hearing in Harris’ rape case, June 28, 2022, he told Judge Anthony D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court that he ran into problems in the Trumbull County jail and that he was then moved back to the Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown.

But Harris told the judge at the June 28, 2022, hearing he did not believe he should be in the Ohio State Penitentiary because that is where the incidents that led to the disrupting public services and vandalism occurred. Harris said he did not feel safe there.