In April 1994, a woman was confronted by a man outside a Denver convenience store, kidnapped, raped twice and had her neck broken, leaving her a quadriplegic.
After testimony Thursday from a cold-case detective, a Denver judge ordered Benjamin Anderson to stand trial for first-degree sexual assault and second-degree kidnapping in the 12-year-old case.
Anderson, 31, showed no emotion as Detective Barbara Wimmer described a recent interview she had with Anderson in prison and a visit she had with the wheelchair-bound victim, now 60.
Wimmer said she went to the prison – where Anderson is serving time for another 1994 sexual assault – after cold-case investigators in March put DNA left by the 1994 rapist into a national database.
Wimmer said that Anderson told her he didn’t have a lot of memory about the specific incident. But during that time, he was committing a lot of robberies and looking for vulnerable victims who were alone, he said.
When asked where the sexual assault occurred, Anderson said it would have occurred in the front seat – the place where the 1994 victim was raped.
According to testimony during Thursday’s preliminary hearing, the victim was on her way to work and had stopped at the convenience store for coffee. As she left, she was confronted by a man who asked her for a ride. She told him she was in a rush and couldn’t give him a lift.
But he followed her to her car, yanked open the passenger door and thanked her for giving him a ride. Moments later, he became violent, pushing her head down, telling her to work the gas pedal while he steered the car. He said he’d break her neck if she resisted.
Wimmer said the victim told her that the car stopped, and when the man told her to undress, she resisted. He hit her in the neck, she heard a pop and then went numb. The woman, 48 at the time, said he raped her and then drove the car a distance, where it became lodged on railroad tracks.
She was raped a second time, and the assailant left.
Defense attorney Brian Leedy pointed out that 12 years ago, the victim was shown a photo lineup and the woman picked out a man named “Robert Washington” as her assailant. But Wimmer said that no “Robert Washington” was ever prosecuted.
Staff writer Howard Pankratz can be reached at 303-820-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com.
