SAN ANTONIO – Two years before he raped and robbed a nurse in her Medical Center apartment, Anton Harris, 21, groped a woman in a stairwell at her Medical Center apartment, according to prosecutors in the Harris trial.
On Wednesday, he was convicted of raping and robbing the nurse on the night of May 28, 2017.
During the punishment phase of his trial Friday, a woman testified that on March 19, 2015, she was groped by someone she described as a young, thin black man as she was returning to her apartment.
“I was walking up the stairs. I felt someone grab and put their hand underneath my bottom," the woman testified.
Punishment phase begins in Medical Center rape trial
A police officer testified that he stopped Harris while investigating that attack as well as other sexual attacks police had been investigating in the area, but released him.
Several months later, the woman, whom we are not identifying due to the nature of the case, identified Harris as the person who groped her in the stairwell.
She also identified him in court on Friday.
Earlier during the trial’s punishment phase 4, other women who Harris is accused of raping and robbing in 2016 and 2017 testified against him, offering graphic accounts of their attacks.
When the trial resumes on Monday in Judge Frank Castro’s 399th District Court, Harris’ attorneys plan to call witnesses to testify on their client’s behalf.
Anton Harris found guilty in Medical Center rape trial
He is facing a maximum sentence of life in prison.