Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 6, 1995                   TAG: 9509060090
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: S.D. HARRINGTON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

COUPLE, 3 OTHERS ACCUSED OF ASSAULT

Sgt. D.R. Divers of the Salem Police Department gave this account of the night's events:

Donald Ray Oliver, 24, and Joni Marie Harmon, 19, of the 400 block of Yorkshire Street, were arguing at about 2:30 a.m. at a public telephone on the corner of Colorado Street and Apperson Drive.

Two teen-agers walked up and asked whether the couple was finished with the phone.

Oliver said they were finished and bent down to pick up some rings Harmon had thrown to the ground, Divers said.

Then both teens began to beat Oliver. They fled, and Harmon chased them.

The teens stopped running and grabbed Harmon. One held her down while the other hit her in the face, Divers said.

Then they fled again.

Oliver and Harmon went back to their apartment. Later they learned that the two teen-agers had been to a party nearby, Divers said.

About 5 a.m., a man and a woman approached a house on the 1500 block of King Street, he said.

The owner of the house answered the door, and the man swung at her with a stick. A man rushed to the door moments later and he also was attacked, Divers said. He suffered a hand injury.

The attacker dropped the stick and the man in the house picked it up. He chased the attacker and the woman to their car and began swinging the stick at them, shattering the windshield of the car, Divers said.

Oliver has been charged with malicious wounding in connection with the attacks at the house on King Street.

Harmon has been charged with assault and battery.

Richard Steven Poole, 19, has been charged with malicious wounding in connection with the beating of Oliver. A 17-year-old, whom police did not name because of his age, was charged with malicious wounding and assault and battery in connection with the beating of Harmon.

Robert Edward Lawrence, 20, has been charged with assault and battery and destruction of private property in connection with the King Street attack.