Alleged Assault Victim Accused as Con Artist : Crime: Sex trial of Oxnard man, 85, is delayed after public defender makes charge about woman, 20.

The sexual-assault trial of an 85-year-old Oxnard man was put on hold Thursday after a public defender accused the 20-year-old alleged victim of being a con artist who has stolen thousands of dollars from other senior citizens.

Prosecutors agreed on Thursday to delay the start of Victor Melilli’s misdemeanor trial so they could check into the background of the alleged victim, who has worked as a live-in helper for the defendant and other elderly residents in Ventura County.

Deputy Public Defender Shirley D. Lorenz said the woman is under investigation by Ventura police, who suspect she may have stolen thousands of dollars from an elderly Ventura woman. A second elderly woman has also filed a complaint against the alleged victim with the county’s Adult Protective Services, Lorenz said.

An Adult Protective Services official declined to confirm the nature of the complaint filed with his agency against the woman, who could not be reached for comment Thursday. Nor could Ventura police officials familiar with that agency’s investigation be reached.

But in an interview, Florence Levy of San Diego--who filed the complaint with Ventura police----called the woman a crook.

The woman--whose name is being withheld because of her sexual-assault complaint--worked for Levy’s elderly aunt in Ventura.

Levy said the woman charged $3,000 to a credit card in her aunt’s name, ran up an $800 phone bill and stole $1,350 in checks that her aunt had received from some rental property.

Told of the woman’s sexual-assault claim against Melilli, Levy said: “I don’t believe it. I believe she’s capable of defending herself against an 85-year-old man.”

Lorenz criticized the district attorney’s office’s handling of the case, saying prosecutors should not have filed a charge of sexual battery against Melilli--who has no criminal record--without knowing the alleged victim’s background.

“The bottom line is this girl is a predator on old people in this community, and the district attorney’s office is helping her do it,” said Lorenz, Melilli’s attorney.

“You don’t go making sex charges against some man without checking out the victim,” she said. “That’s frightening. It’s wrong. They are so busy prosecuting people that they fail to investigate the truthfulness of the charge.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Lela Henke-Dobroth, who supervises the sexual-assault unit of the prosecutor’s office, defended the case against the elderly man.

“I’m very distressed at Ms. Lorenz’s comment that the D.A.’s office is helping out” the 20-year-old woman, Henke-Dobroth said.

She said it would be unethical for the prosecutor’s office to run criminal checks on people who come there to file criminal charges. Such checks also would create a staffing problem for the office, Henke-Dobroth said.

“We’d have to have 10 times the staff we have now,” she said.

According to officials and court records, the woman accepted a job working for Melilli on Jan. 28. She got the job after claiming to be a “certified nurse,” having a driver’s license and owning a car, Lorenz said.

The position of certified nurse does not exist, according to Lorenz, who also said the woman had neither a car nor a driver’s license.

The woman told authorities that during her first and only day on the job, the man committed sexual battery by fondling her, prosecutors said. During one interview with district attorney officials, the woman cried and vomited while recounting the alleged incident with Melilli, prosecutors said, and based on that and other information, Melilli was charged.

Since the charge is a misdemeanor, the elderly man was not arrested but was given a notice to appear in court. He could not be reached for comment.

Lorenz provided prosecutors with a report before the scheduled start of Melilli’s trial Thursday that alleged that the woman had victimized other elderly people in Ventura County.

She asked prosecutors to drop the charge against her client.

Henke-Dobroth said prosecutors are now investigating the woman’s associations with other elderly people to see if there is any reason to believe she may have committed crimes or if the charges against Melilli might have been fabricated.

“Anytime somebody tells us that there is information that a crime did not occur, we certainly would do this,” Henke-Dobroth said.

The case against Melilli is now set for Monday in Municipal Judge Edward F. Brodie’s courtroom.