Written by Sept. 5 in the Houston Chronicle
With her eyes on the former Houston police officer she accuses of rape, the waitress slammed her palms on the rail in front of the witness stand.
She was showing the jury how she says he had pushed her against a car parked just outside the cantina where she worked.
“That’s when he started touching my breast,” the woman, 37, said Wednesday through a translator.
“Do you remember? Do you remember when you did that to me?” she yelled, leaning forward. “He ruined my life! He ruined my life!”
She leaned back and rested her forehead on her fist to cry as state District Judge Denis Collins asked the jury to leave. Harris County prosecutors guided the woman into another room to calm down.
It was the most dramatic moment in the two-day trial of 28-year-old Abraham Joseph.
The former Houston Police Department officer is charged with two counts of aggravated sexual assault in the alleged January 2011 rape, and faces a possible prison sentence of five years to life. His accuser has also filed a civil suit against him.
The Houston Chronicle does not identify victims of sexual assaults.
On Wednesday the jury heard the woman recount her first meeting with Joseph, months before the alleged rape.
JAYME FRASER 