Man Convicted in Serial Rape Case : Crime: Monette Johnson, 35, may face a sentence of more than 150 years. Several victims have been told they were exposed to HIV.

A prison parolee was convicted Tuesday of being a serial rapist who sexually assaulted six women and one man during a series of late-night attacks in the San Fernando Valley.

After two days of deliberations, a Van Nuys Superior Court panel convicted Monette Johnson, a 35-year-old Lake View Terrace man, who prosecutors said slipped into his victims’ residences through unlocked doors and windows.

“I’m so glad we got the bastard,” one of Johnson’s victims said after the verdicts were announced. “He’s really an evil man. He has no remorse.”

Johnson was convicted of eight counts of rape, one count of sodomy, one count of digital penetration and three counts of forced oral copulation. The jury also found him guilty on six counts each of robbery and burglary and a single charge of receiving stolen property.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Phillip H. Rabichow, who prosecuted the case, said a “quick calculation” reveals that Johnson faces “150-some years” in state prison when he is sentenced March 14 by Judge John Fisher.

During a trial that began Jan. 11 and was interrupted for a week and a half when the Northridge earthquake struck, a jury of seven men and five women heard each of the sexual assault victims testify about their ordeals in late 1991 and early 1992.

After reaching their decisions, jurors said they believed the victims’ testimony but were convinced of Johnson’s guilt by a wealth of other evidence.

“The prosecution’s evidence was so overwhelming that nothing the defense presented changed our minds,” juror Laura Halstead said.

Johnson was linked to the crimes by a preponderance of evidence that included an identification by one victim, a fingerprint at one scene and stolen property recovered in Johnson’s apartment.

But most important, according to Rabichow and the jurors, was genetic evidence that almost conclusively identified Johnson as the man who raped and sodomized the victims.

Scientists testified that DNA found in semen collected after the rapes was compared with DNA in Johnson’s blood and the match was identical. During the trial, one geneticist said the DNA evidence led him to conclude that the odds are 1 in 43 million that Johnson is innocent.

“That’s almost irrefutable,” Halstead said.

During the trial, defense attorney M. David Houchin attacked the DNA evidence, particularly the statistical figures, which he said are “predictions based on theories.”

Houchin, vacationing out of state, was not present when the verdicts were read.

Johnson’s case gained attention in January, 1992, when police arrested the alleged serial rapist, who initially was suspected of attacking 15 women. Later, prosecutors determined there was enough evidence to charge him with attacking six women and the boyfriend of one of the female victims.

Interest in the case intensified recently when it was revealed that four of the rape victims were informed they had been exposed to the HIV virus, which causes AIDS. But neither the county Department of Health Services nor the four victims can legally say if Johnson is responsible because people with the virus are protected by state confidentiality laws.

The other two female victims and several other alleged rape victims were alerted that they may have been exposed to the virus but were never told who was responsible.

“In this case, it’s just wrong,” said a 24-year-old rape victim, who received a notice from the health department and was told who is responsible.

Assemblywoman Paula Boland (R-Granada Hills) introduced legislation Monday that will require courts to provide the results of HIV tests to victims of sexual assaults.

The questions of HIV and AIDS were never presented to the jury weighing Johnson’s fate.

However, jurors briefly discussed whether Johnson is infected with the deadly virus “because AIDS is such a big issue,” Halstead said. She added that it would not have changed the jury’s verdict had the panel been told that Johnson was responsible for infecting his victims with the HIV virus.