Suspect Held in Rape Case at Cal State Fullerton : Crime: Laborer arrested at his apartment just north of the campus is being questioned in an assault reported by an 18-year-old dormitory student.

A 39-year-old laborer was arrested Friday on suspicion of raping a Cal State Fullerton freshman at knifepoint last week, authorities said.

Terry Lonnie Briggs was served with an arrest warrant at his apartment just north of the campus at 4 p.m. Friday, said William D. Huffman, assistant chief of police at Cal State Fullerton.

Briggs was taken to university police headquarters, where he was being questioned late Friday, Huffman said. Briggs was to be transferred later to the Orange County Jail in Santa Ana and held on $50,000 bail.

Campus detectives obtained an arrest warrant for Briggs after the 18-year-old victim identified him from a photograph.

Huffman said university police had Briggs’ picture because he had been questioned a few months earlier in connection with the fraudulent use of a university credit card. The card had been assigned to a vehicle in the campus motor pool.

The credit card matter was settled out of court without an arrest. “We were working on restitution,” Huffman said.

Campus police declined to say what information led them to consider Briggs a possible suspect in the Jan. 31 attack.

The unidentified woman told police that she was accosted at knifepoint about 8:30 p.m. on a campus road paralleling the Orange Freeway. She was returning to her dormitory after walking alone to a nearby gas station convenience store to buy cigarettes.

The victim told police that a man wearing a brown jacket and brown trousers grabbed her, pulled her into bushes lining the roadway, raped her, then fled on a bicycle.

To alert students, university police held security meetings for the 400 residents of campus housing. And police warned that students, particularly women, should avoid walking alone at night.

Briggs is scheduled to be arraigned early next week in Municipal Court.