Doctor’s Sedation-Rape Trial Begins

The trial of a Panorama City physician, accused of raping an 18-year-old woman after he injected her with a powerful sedative, began Tuesday in Van Nuys Superior Court.

Dr. Julian Milestone, 58, is charged with one count of forcible rape and one count of administering a stupefying drug to commit a felony.

If convicted on both counts, Milestone, a Romanian-born general practitioner who lives in Northridge, could be sentenced to eight years in prison and have his medical license revoked, Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Imerman said.

Sought Trauma Treatment

His alleged victim, a Van Nuys woman, was the opening witness at the trial. The woman, now 19, testified that she sought the help of Milestone for treatment of the trauma she suffered as a result of being raped in a Valley park when she was 15.

Milestone allegedly took the woman to her Van Nuys apartment on the evening of Sept. 1, 1983, where he injected her with sodium amytal, a sleep-inducing drug, and raped her, the prosecutor said.

In opening statements Tuesday, defense attorney Robert Rentzer denied that Milestone and the woman ever had a doctor-patient relationship.

“They were romantically involved,” Rentzer told the court. “We intend to prove there was knowing mutual consent.”

Met in Restaurant

The alleged victim testified that she was introduced to Milestone by her roommate, and that they met for the first time at a San Fernando Valley restaurant in August, 1983. The woman said that, because of the earlier rape, “I truly felt that I needed help in my relationships with members of the opposite sex.”

She testified that, during her third meeting with Milestone, which also took place at a restaurant, Milestone proposed a treatment for her problem. His treatment, she said, was to inject her with a drug so that she “could become relaxed, and then we would be able to talk freely.”

At a preliminary hearing, the woman testified that, after being injected with the drug at her apartment, she “felt I was there but I wasn’t. I tried to get up but I was too heavy.”

Taken to Hospital

The woman’s roommate testified at the preliminary hearing that she discovered the couple in the room and took the woman to a nearby hospital.

Milestone was arrested the following day. He was released from custody after posting $10,000 bail, Imerman said.

Rentzer said that the defense will show the couple did not have a doctor-patient relationship. Defense witnesses will testify that they saw Milestone and the woman in restaurants, engaging in public displays of affection, he said.

Consent Denied

But Imerman said that no “voluntary, knowing consent was given by the victim.”

The prosecutor said that the woman agreed to treatment by Milestone because “he told her that the shot of sodium amytal would relax her to the point where she could freely discuss her sexual problems without any inhibitions.”

Had she known that the drug would render her unconscious and that the doctor would force himself upon her, Imerman said, “she never would have consented to the shot.”

The trial, which is is being heard before Judge Richard G. Kolostian, is expected to last three weeks.