Smartt convicted of sexual battery of elderly jogger

CHATTANOOGA (WDEF) – Diontae Smartt was found guilty on Friday of aggravated sexual battery from a notorious case dating back to 2014.

The victim was a 69 year old, male jogger.

Smartt was just 17 years old at the time, but he was tried as an adult.

This was his second trial for the crime.

The first ended in a hung jury.

Today’s jury deliberated about five hours before returning the guilty verdict around 5PM this evening.

The assault happened on September 29th of 2014.

The victim was running on West Mississippi Avenue in North Chattanooga in the morning.

The case became somewhat controversial when Police originally called it an assault, not a sexual assault.  Here is our story on that issue in 2014.

A resident told us after the attack “I certainly would have wanted to know there’s a rapist lose in the neighborhood because most of the time I’m running or walking and I have headphones on and I’m not paying attention to what’s going on around me.”

Joggers we talked to at the time were concerned that such a thing happened in their neighborhood.

One woman told us “You normally think it’s a safe neighborhood and don’t think anything like that would happen, especially at 7:30 in the morning when a lot of people are taking their kids to school.”

And another neighbor said “You know, these days you have to be on the lookout everywhere you go. The city is pretty safe but there’s crazy people everywhere and you have to keep your eyes out and be aware of your surroundings.”