A Lehi man has been acquitted by a jury of abducting, beating and raping his former girlfriend over a 12-hour period last October.

James Albino Tanner, 58, was found not guilty earlier this month in 4th District Court of first-degree felony counts of rape and aggravated kidnapping.

Provo defense attorney Aaron Dodd said Monday that the evidence at Tanner's trial "discounted the lady's testimony."

The alleged victim had told police Tanner repeatedly sexually assaulted her in his van at a Lehi parking lot. But on the witness stand, she said she was raped only once.

Dodd said the woman also described "a lot of fighting, a lot of hitting and a lot of shoving — a very violent thing." But the physical evidence of such a fight "just wasn't there," he said.

The case against Tanner also included a phone conversation, taped by police, of Tanner apologizing to the woman.

But Dodd said the jury "was able to hear that the apology was for the [verbal] argument they had that night. Not for anything else."

He said that according to a medical expert for the state, the "so-called injuries" to the woman's genitals were consistent with either consensual or non-consensual intercourse.

"I think the jury did its job," Dodd said. "They looked at the evidence and rightly determined the state had not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the crimes charged were committed."

Also this month, Dodd won an acquittal for a man accused of having sex with an unconscious woman last May.

Christopher Steven Ball, 29, was found not guilty of first-degree felony rape.

Ball "allegedly told a number of people ... that he had sex and [the woman] may have passed out," Dodd said. "But police did nothing else. They took his alleged confession and ran with it, without investigating further.

"I was able to show the jury the many holes in the story, which to me showed that no sex occurred that night."

Tanner was acquitted April 1. Ball was found not guilty Wednesday.

Dodd said that having back-to-back rape trials was unusual. "But both clients were in custody, and both wanted their trial," he said.