Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, July 17, 1990 TAG: 9007170029
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Medium
Speaking in a firm voice, the woman testified she has trouble walking and seeing, cannot smell - and cannot remember why.
She said she remembers breaking a dinner date with a friend on April 19, 1989, because of work, but does not remember entering the park to run around 9:30 p.m., when she was gang-raped and viciously beaten by marauding youths who left her naked and near death in a puddle of mud and blood.
"What was your very next memory?" asked Assistant District Attorney Elizabeth Lederer.
"I remember waking up in the hospital on a Friday evening, late in May," she said. "A very good friend of mine was in the room and so was a nurse. It was the Memorial Day weekend."
She said she was in the hospital about six weeks before being transferred to a rehabilitation center.
During her 10 minutes on the stand, the woman did not appear to look at the three youths charged with maiming her; the three looked at their hands, fiddled with pens or stared into space.
There were no obvious reactions by the jurors.
Defense attorneys asked the witness no questions.
"Do you suffer any lasting injuries as a result of what happened to you on April 19, 1989?" asked Lederer.
"I have problems with balance when I'm walking and coordination. At times, I'll veer off to the right or the left," she said. "I have trouble walking down steps. I also lost my sense of smell completely. That has not come back.
"I have double vision. When I'm reading, I hold papers over to the left to compensate. It takes a fair amount of concentration to make the image one."
In an attempt to blunt assertions by defense attorneys that a rape may not have occurred, the jogger was questioned about her sexual activity and use of a diaphragm for birth control.
The woman, who was attacked on a Wednesday, testified that she had last had sex the previous Sunday, with her boyfriend. Afterward, she went running with her boyfriend and with a diaphragm still inserted.
The victim, the prosecution's 34th witness, was called as the trial entered its fourth week.
Antron McCray, Raymond Santana and Yusef Salaam, all 16, are charged with attempted murder, rape, sexual abuse, assault, robbery and riot in the attack on the woman and two male joggers.
They are being tried in an adult court, but if convicted they will be sentenced as juvenile offenders to up to 10 years in prison.
Three other youths face trial later this year.
by CNB