Dana Beatty was raped at knifepoint inside her Cincinnati home on Aug. 1, 1989. In 2024, investigators matched DNA evidence to Frederick Louis Tanzer, who later admitted the attack. But Ohio’s statute of limitations had expired, preventing prosecutors from charging him with rape.

Beatty and her longtime friend Nancy Aichholz are pushing state lawmakers to eliminate that time limit, Local 12 reported Oct. 16. Both women lived in Hyde Park in the 1980s and met as career-driven professionals in their 20s.

Beatty moved to Cincinnati in 1982 to work at IBM. On the day of the attack, she told Local 12, she came home from work early and noticed something was wrong. Her bathroom light was on, and it appeared someone had used it.

She described a masked intruder in "head-to-toe black Lycra" jumping from her kitchen with a butcher knife. He grabbed her and held the blade to her throat, she said.

The case went cold for decades. Police had DNA from the scene. Beatty told Local 12 her daughter urged investigators in 2023 to review the case again.

Frederick Louis Tanzer, a doctor who practiced in Ohio, Colorado and Kansas, was arrested Dec. 11, 2024, after the FBI and Cincinnati Police matched his DNA to evidence from 1989, according to Fox 19. Investigators obtained Tanzer's DNA from a discarded coffee cup, NBC News reported.

Prosecutors discovered the original six-year statute of limitations had already expired by 1995. A 2015 update to Ohio law extended the limit to 25 years with a DNA extension, but that change did not revive cases where the clock had already run out, according to NBC News.

Investigators devised a workaround. They approached Tanzer as a witness, not a suspect, and he lied to federal agents about the attack. He pleaded guilty in September 2025 to three counts of making false statements to the FBI. He was sentenced Jan. 28 to the maximum 15 years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Prosecutors also alleged that Tanzer had drugged and sexually assaulted his current and former wives. He was not charged in connection with those allegations.

Beatty and Aichholz are working to find state lawmakers who will support removing the statute of limitations for rape in Ohio.

"There's no statute on her pain. There is no statute on the generational impact that this has had on her family," Aichholz told Local 12.

Aichholz disclosed she is running for state representative and said changing the law is her mission regardless of whether she is elected. The Cincinnati Enquirer reported in August that Hamilton County Republicans selected Aichholz to run for Ohio's 27th District, challenging Democratic Rep. Rachel Baker.

Baker and state Sen. Bill Blessing, a Republican, co-led a bipartisan Safer Communities Legislative Working Group that released findings Sept. 23 recommending full elimination of the criminal statute of limitations for rape and sexual battery, the Enquirer reported.

Blessing said in late September he planned to introduce legislation during the fall session, though the short lame-duck period could push the bill to early 2027.

Beatty has also filed a civil lawsuit against Tanzer. Her attorney, Jeffrey Kenney, told Cincinnati.com the lawsuit's goal was to have Tanzer undergo a deposition and explain more about the crime.