Trial starts for man accused of sex torture of studentThe Associated Press
6:02 PM EDT, June 5, 2008
An ex-convict went on trial Thursday on charges of raping, torturing and burning a Columbia University graduate student in a 19-hour attack during which her eyelids were slit and she was forced to ingest a massive dose of painkillers that caused liver failure.
Robert Williams, 31, sat with chained arms and legs, his head lowered, as the prosecutor delivered an opening statement that left several people in the courtroom weeping.
Williams violated the 23-year-old woman "in every way imaginable and in some ways unimaginable," Assistant District Attorney Ann Prunty told the jury, turning the victim's small one-bedroom apartment into "his torture chamber." Prunty said Williams stopped the torture only after the victim -- who at one point tried to kill herself to escape the ordeal -- blacked out from hours of pain caused by knife wounds, boiling water, battering and sexual assaults.
Williams is charged with kidnapping, arson, burglary and sexual assault in the attack on the woman on April 13, 2007. He faces life in prison if convicted.
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