Woman Testifies Defendant Was Not Her Attacker : Courts: A homeless man is accused of raping and beating the mentally retarded victim last July. The trial resumes this week.

A homeless man accused of brutally beating and raping a mentally retarded woman on a busy Santa Monica street last summer came face to face with his alleged victim last week, but--using childlike language that underscored her impairment--she insisted he was not her assailant.

The attack drew widespread attention and further fueled the backlash against the seaside community’s homeless population when it happened last July, but the courtroom was empty as the 49-year-old woman took the stand.

The victim, who has the mind of a 7-year-old, glanced cautiously at the defendant, Chester Runions, 39, then repeatedly told a jury during two days of heartrending testimony that, “No, he isn’t” the man who assaulted her.

“Do you know this man?” defense attorney Stuart Glovin asked, placing his hands on Runions’ shoulders.

“No, I don’t,” the woman replied.

“Did this man do it that day?” Glovin continued, referring to the attack she had just described for jurors.

“No,” the woman said, shaking her head.

“Did you tell the police this is not the man who did it?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Is that the truth?”

“Yes.”

However, Deputy Dist. Atty. Lauren Weis said outside the courtroom that the case against Runions is solid, despite the victim’s failure to identify him as her attacker. Among the evidence she cited:

* Bite marks on the victim’s body match the unusual pattern of Runions’ teeth, according to a dental expert who testified.

* Three witnesses have identified Runions as the assailant.

* Laboratory tests show that the blood on Runions’ glove, pant leg and tennis shoe is that of the victim.

Runions, who was covered with blood when he was arrested at 20th Street and Pico Boulevard, the scene of the crime, initially told police he was a good Samaritan trying to help the woman.

He is charged with seven felony counts, including assault likely to produce great bodily injury, robbery, mayhem, forcible oral copulation, penetration of a genital opening and rape. If convicted, he would face a maximum sentence of 44 years in prison.

The woman, who lives at Hirshorn Manor, a Santa Monica board-and-care home for the mentally disabled, said she looked forward each day to walking to a nearby thrift shop to buy inexpensive purses for her collection. Described as a gentle, trusting person, the woman testified that she had just bought a brown shoulder bag that afternoon and was on her way home.

Then, she said, “somebody called me over. Hurt my back and neck. Raped me. Beat me. I couldn’t get up. I blacked out.”

She said she screamed, and the man told her, “Shut up or I’ll kill you.”

She said he “made me kiss his penis” and “hurt me down in my (genital) area.”

The attacker broke her cheekbone and damaged one eye, bit her, slashed her and added her purse to a plastic bag containing his belongings tied to a shopping cart. The attack took place in the trees and bushes behind a liquor store.

According to initial police reports, hundreds of passers-by ignored her cries--recalling the 1964 Kitty Genovese case in New York City in which a 28-year-old woman was stalked and stabbed to death as three dozen of her neighbors watched and did not get involved. But police later said that the reports were not true and that at least two people called the police and tried to intervene.

A passing driver grabbed a plastic bag to cover the woman’s naked, bleeding body.

The attack took place at a busy intersection near Santa Monica College. Area merchants said a wall and shrubbery partially block view of the site, a magnet for the homeless.

When the trial resumes this week, the defense will contend that Runions is the victim of mistaken identity.

“We will not dispute that it happened. But it was not done by Mr. Runions,” Glovin said. “He is a homeless man who was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. That’s why he’s a suspect.”

Glovin noted that when Runions was brought before her at the hospital, the victim said, “that’s not him,” and has described her assailant as a black male with very curly black hair. Runions is white.

A psychologist who administered a battery of tests to the woman said she is too unsophisticated to fabricate a story, but could be influenced and misled into making false statements. At the trial, the meaning of her words were sometimes unclear.

“Did you ever tell anyone this was a black man?” Weis asked at one point.

“He was dirty,” the woman replied.

“What color is dirty?” Weis went on.

“Real black,” the woman answered.

“And is that the color he was?”

“Yes.”

The woman, who is severely impaired with an I.Q. of only 28 appeared confused by the gentle questions both sides posed.

Pointing to a photograph of Runions taken just after the attack, the woman said, “ He did it.” She said she understood that the defendant and the man shown in the photograph are the same person, although they look different. Runions has gained weight and shaved off a heavy mustache.

But when asked if she saw her attacker anywhere in the courtroom, she said, “No, I don’t.”

“Are you afraid to say something about the man in the yellow sweater?” Weis asked, gesturing toward Runions. The woman answered, “No.”