Fayetteville police investigating rape

A woman told police she was walking in the area around Murchison Road around 7:55 a.m. when a middle-aged black man driving what appeared to a brown Pontiac Grand Am approached her and offered her a ride.

Police said the woman accepted and that the man drove her a few blocks away, pulled a handgun and raped her.

Investigators describe the man as standing about 5 feet 9 inches and weighing about 200 pounds. He was wearing a goatee, had close cropped hair and a tattoo on his right arm.

A new policy stipulates that Fayetteville police must notify the general public within 72 hours of the sexual assault of an adult in which the suspect is unknown.

The policy was changed in January in the wake of a series of rapes in Fayetteville and Hope Mills from June 2009 to January. Police did not publicly link the cases until January.

Authorities have not named a suspect in those cases, and police gave no indication that Thursday's report is connected to them.