Rape Suspect Went Uncharged Despite 4 Reports to Police

Four women, in separate incidents between 1985 and 1987, told police that Thomas J. Panichas, a businessman from Costa Mesa, had either raped or sexually molested them. But it wasn’t until a fifth victim, a Las Vegas woman, told police in January that Panichas had raped her that he was arrested.

Panichas, 31, who now faces charges involving all five women, evaded arrest during those years through his own ingenuity, and a few lucky breaks, law enforcement officials contend.

“I know how it looks--that someone screwed up,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Marv Stern. “But the truth is, until (the Las Vegas woman) came forward, it was tough to make a case against him.”

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All five women, all blond, have told police much the same story--that Panichas wore a nice suit, drove a new white Cadillac, and impressed them with brochures about owning his own company.

Three women testified Wednesday at the first day of Panichas’ preliminary hearing in Newport Beach’s Harbor Court that they were all approached by Panichas at bars, and that he seemed pleasant.

Then one testified that, after she refused him a kiss, she was sexually assaulted and physical abused by Panichas during three hours of captivity in his car. The other two spoke quietly about the terror they felt when he choked them and forced them into sexual intercourse and other sex acts.

The Las Vegas woman told Municipal Judge Christopher J. Strople that when she closed her eyes during the rape, Panichas forced her eyelids open with his fingers.

She had met Panichas at a bar in Las Vegas on Jan. 8, she said. He told her he was the head of his own communications company--which was true--and that he was expanding into the Las Vegas market. She said he suggested she come to Orange County for a job interview with him.

She arrived on Jan. 20, the day she claims he raped her in her hotel room at the Irvine Hilton. She reported the incident to the Las Vegas police when she returned there the next day. Friends also reported it to Larry Montgomery, an Irvine Police Department investigator.

Panichas was not an unknown name to Orange County prosecutors. In fact, at the time of the Las Vegas woman’s rape, prosecutors were investigating other sexual assault allegations against him.

The four alleged previous victims, in chronological order, were:

A Tustin woman who said she met Panichas at a Newport Beach nightclub in May, 1985. They later met for tea and crumpets at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, she said. She claims he molested her in his car later, and refused to let her out for at least three hours.

The woman reported a sexual assault to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department two days later. But no case was brought to county prosecutors.

A Huntington Beach woman who was a contestant in a Hot Legs contest at a Huntington Beach bar said she met Panichas there, and agreed to go out for coffee with him. She claims he drugged a glass of water she was drinking, then forced her into his Costa Mesa apartment, where, she charges, he raped her.

She told the Costa Mesa police about the rape four days later. No case was taken to county prosecutors.

A woman whose sister worked for Panichas at his Fountain Valley cellular telephone business--Western Communications Corp.--claims he interviewed her for a job, then raped her in his office in June, 1987.

Fountain Valley police did take this case to county prosecutors. But the district attorney’s office decided against filing charges.

A woman who met Panichas at a probation office (he was on probation on a misdemeanor check fraud conviction in Orange County) said he offered her a job. During the job interview at his Fountain Valley office, he attempted to rape her, the woman told Fountain Valley police.

Again, the Fountain Valley police took this case to the district attorney’s office. Again, no charges were filed.

“But in all these cases, you have to look at the circumstances,” prosecutor Stern said.

In the two 1985 incidents, Stern said, there was no corroborating evidence to support the women’s claims. The Costa Mesa woman’s bruises had vanished by the time she reported the rape. The Tustin woman had not been raped, and had admitted getting in the car with him to go on a date.

In the first 1987 incident, Stern said, there was a tremendous credibility problem. The victim’s sister reportedly made statements to the police that helped Panichas’ case.

And more importantly, neither prosecutors nor the Fountain Valley police knew about the two 1985 incidents, in which allegations were made against Panichas.

The best case, Stern claims, was the November, 1987, incident. With that case, prosecutors felt they also could have brought charges against him in the first Fountain Valley incident.

But the case fell apart when the November, 1987, assault victim decided at that time not to cooperate with authorities. Without her help, the first Fountain Valley rape could not have stood a “reasonable doubt” test with a jury, Stern said.

It wasn’t until investigator Montgomery began the painstaking task of going through old police reports from other cities about interviews with Panichas that he came across the two 1985 reports.

Police computers will only tell police who has been arrested, and Panichas had not been arrested in 1985, Montgomery explained.

Agencies Defended

But he strongly defended the police agencies’ decision in 1985 not to push for prosecution.

“If you have a woman dragged in the bushes and raped, she reports it 15 minutes later and she’s covered with bruises, you have a good chance at a prosecution,” Montgomery said. “But you have a woman report a rape four days later, her word against his, they’ve met at a bar, those kinds of cases are extremely difficult to prosecute.”

In the Costa Mesa case, for example, Panichas had roommates who confirmed they had been in a back bedroom that night and that they heard no screams or commotion.

Stern alleged that Panichas “managed to avoid prosecution because he was shrewd enough to make sure these were all one-on-one situations, with no chance for us to find any corroborating evidence. He also knew he did not fit the normal pattern of a rapist,” Stern said.

For example, Panichas made no effort to hide his identity from any of the alleged victims, Stern said, noting that he gave several of them his business card.

Panichas’ attorney, James Brustman, asked the alleged Costa Mesa victim in court Wednesday why she had waited four days to report it to the police.

“I was scared, confused, I didn’t know what to do,” she said. “He told me that if I told the police, he would deny it; who would believe that a successful businessman would do something like this?”