Week in Review : MAJOR EVENTS, IMAGES AND PEOPLE IN ORANGE COUNTY NEWS : COURTS : Mission Viejo Night Stalker Hearing Put Off as Victim Struggles to Recover

The tall, rangy drifter from Texas suspected of being the Night Stalker and killer of 15 people, came to Orange County this week to face charges that he shot a Mission Viejo man and raped the man’s girlfriend.

But the preliminary hearing for Richard Ramirez, 25, in Orange County Superior Court was postponed for a year to clear the way for his anticipated lengthy trial in Los Angeles, scheduled to begin Sept. 2.

Ramirez is accused of killing 14 people in Los Angeles County and a San Francisco man between June, 1984, and August, 1985.

He also is accused of the Aug. 25, 1985, attack on William Carns, 30, and his girlfriend in their Mission Viejo home.

Carns, who was shot three times in the head that night, remains partially paralyzed and has no short-term memory.

But his parents, interviewed by phone Friday at their Williston, N.D., home, said that he is making progress at a Long Beach residential program for victims of head injuries.

He is able to lift his left foot a little but has no use of his left arm, they said. He is able to walk short distances, with help. And he is able to go home to his fiancee in Mission Viejo on weekends.

But “he doesn’t remember from Monday to Friday,” his father, William Carns, said. “He doesn’t remember 15 to 20 minutes.”

His mother, Anne, said, “They’re trying to train his brain, but he will never have full function. It’s very sad for a young man of 30 years.”