Attempted Rape Suspect 'Stunned' By Woman's Reaction

Man Says He Thought Woman Was Prostitute

POSTED: 2:27 pm PDT August 8, 2005

OCEANSIDE, Calif. -- An Oceanside man accused of kidnapping and trying to rape a woman who was walking home alone testified Monday that he thought the victim was a prostitute and was stunned at her reaction to his advances.

Marcus Threats, who faces life in prison if convicted, said he did not have time or the ability to carry the woman into a South Coast Highway parking lot, as she has testified.

Threats said he went out around 2 a.m. on Dec. 21 for a jog and in hopes of finding a prostitute for oral sex.

He saw the woman, a 24-year-old walking home from a nightspot, and parked his car on a side street, he said.

"I figured the only women out there after 2 a.m. would be hookers," Threats said. "That's why I approached her."

Threats, 31, testified that he jogged across the highway and came up to the woman from the back.

"The first thing she did was jump," Threats said. "I figured it was a natural reaction in the way I approached her. She was looking at me. You could see she was startled.

"She was scared as hell," he said. "I said, 'My fault. I thought you were working the streets. If you are, I can pay.' Before I finished talking, she screamed loud."

The woman yelled and swung her arms at him, he said, adding that he was "dumbfounded" by her reaction.

The defendant and the alleged victim differ greatly on what happened next.

The woman testified last week that the defendant picked her up and carried her into the parking lot of the Disabled American Veterans building, bashed her head into the pavement and tried to pull her jeans down.

The defendant ran off when three people ran toward them yelling, she said.

Threats, however, said one of the men who came to the scene got there within seconds of her screaming, so there was no time to carry the woman into the parking lot.

Threats said he thought the man was a pimp or boyfriend who would rob him.

He ran down to the beach to sort the situation out in his mind, but was arrested, he said.

Under cross-examination, he conceded that he had only one dollar on him when he was detained, not nearly enough to pay for sex.
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