Prosecution Rests in Denny Trial; Testimony Clashes : Courts: First defense witness says man who testified he saw beating of Denny was attacked by the mob before the trucker came on scene.

Prosecutors rested their case Friday in the trial of two men accused of attempting to murder trucker Reginald O. Denny, saying they had assembled the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle showing “these young men are guilty as charged.”

The first defense witness Friday, however, challenged key elements in testimony from the only prosecution witness who said he had a ground-level view of Damian Monroe Williams hitting Denny in the head with a brick.

Testimony has focused on the fundamental issues of identity and intent, and prosecutors put on 36 witnesses in four weeks--including three eyewitnesses who identified Williams and Henry Keith Watson as assailants who attacked Denny.

Intent--motivation and state of mind--is the critical element that can escalate assault to attempted murder, which carries a maximum penalty of life in prison.

Aggravated mayhem, another life-sentence charge Williams faces for his alleged attack on Denny, also requires showing an intentional infliction of permanent disfigurement.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Lawrence C. Morrison said outside court that his co-prosecutor, Deputy Dist. Atty. Janet Moore, will more fully present the prosecution’s case showing intent in her final argument.

“The case is exactly where we want it to be,” Moore said. “Every piece of the puzzle is important to the completed picture.”

Williams, 20, and Watson, 29, are also charged with assaulting or robbing seven other people at Florence and Normandie avenues, a flash point for rioting after not guilty verdicts in the case of four LAPD officers accused of beating Rodney G. King.

Prosecution witnesses against the men ranged from the salty-tongued Alicia Maldonado, who colorfully described how rioters smashed her car windows as she drove through the intersection of Florence and Normandie avenues, to Denny, who warmly embraced the defendants’ mothers during a recess.

Los Angeles Police Detective Arthur Daedelow, the last prosecution witness, had testified Thursday that a close-up photo made from videotape taken at Florence and Normandie appeared to show that the man prosecutors say is Williams has front teeth missing. Williams then demonstrated to the jury that he had all his front teeth.

Daedelow examined that photo again Friday, along with the videotape from which it was taken, and said: “My opinion is (what appears to be missing teeth) is Mr. Williams’ tongue coming up in front of his teeth.”

The detective defended his having witnesses identify Williams from a photo that had been published in newspapers and broadcast on television, and ended his testimony by comparing a booking photo of Williams with a close-up on videotape. He said there was no question that the two pictures depicted the same person.

Before testimony began, prosecutors said the identities of Williams and Watson would not be an issue, and that aerial and ground-level videotape, photographs and witnesses’ accounts would clearly identify the defendants.

None of the victims--or the good Samaritans who rescued them--could identify any assailants. But they could place themselves and their vehicles at the intersection, and prosecutors focused on two men shown at the scene.

One was dressed in a white T-shirt, blue shorts, black-and-white tennis shoes and a blue bandanna. The other wore a black cap with a tag hanging from it, a white T-shirt with “Hooker’s Bar and Grill” on it and long dark pants.

The first man is Williams, the second Watson, prosecutors said, and they repeated those clothing descriptions every time they asked a witness to point out one of the defendants on videotape.

Defense attorneys were forced into an awkward balancing act. Without conceding that the men on the videotape are their clients, they found themselves defending the men wearing that clothing.

Williams’ attorney, Edi M.O. Faal, would not concede that his client is the man shown on videotape hitting Denny in the head with a brick. But he cross-examined some witnesses--including Denny--in an effort to show that the brick did not cause the injuries shown in the trucker’s medical reports.

But Faal focused on a stain that appears in some footage of the man prosecutors say is Williams, but not in scenes showing the attack on Denny. Prosecutors obtained a photo of the attack shot from a helicopter hovering above the intersection.

The photo, shot by Robert Clark, photo editor of The Outlook newspaper in Santa Monica, showed a dark area on the left forearm of the man throwing a brick at Denny. When that photo was enhanced, it showed a dark area corresponding to the tattoo of a rose on Williams’ left arm, prosecutors said.

Clark, helicopter newsman Robert A. Tur and gas station cashier Gabriel Quintana all said Williams hit Denny in the head with a brick. Moreover, Quintana said Williams had told him before the attacks at the intersection: “Today I’m going to hit and kill people.”

Faal assailed the cashier’s testimony outside court, saying he is “clearly lying” and did not report any threats Williams allegedly made until 13 months later--”coincidentally” in a meeting with prosecutors.

Los Angeles Police Officer Timothy McRath testified that he recognized Williams in televised news footage as the man who hit Denny in the head with a brick and did a little dance immediately afterward.

McRath said he knew Williams from at least 10 earlier contacts and that he could recognize him on sight.

With his first witness Friday, Faal sought to undermine Quintana’s account of the attack on Denny. Phillip Davis, a minister who works as a paralegal, said he was at the intersection and is shown on videotape trying to help trucker Larry Tarvin after he had been beaten.

Davis said Tarvin turned down the help. He then walked to the Unocal station where Quintana worked and saw the cashier on the ground being attacked--before the attack on Denny. Quintana had testified that rioters attacked him at the service station after the assault on Denny.

Davis also said he saw Denny’s eyes roll back in his head before the trucker slumped as though unconscious while still in the cab. Defense attorneys have maintained that Denny’s most serious head injuries were inflicted before he was pulled from the truck.