Santa Rosa rapist found guilty in attack, abduction

<p>Sonoma County jurors Thursday convicted a Santa Rosa man of raping and stabbing a woman he abducted as she was putting her young child into her car at a Bennett Valley grocery store.</p><p>After deliberating four days, the 10-woman, two-man jury returned guilty verdicts on all nine felony counts against Aristotle Quadra, 31, who likely will spend the rest of his life in prison for the Feb. 7 attack.</p><p>The 29-year-old victim was in the courtroom but left without making a public statement. Quadra sat motionless beside his attorney as the verdict was read.</p><p>Sentencing was set for Jan. 21.</p><p>"I'm pleased with the decision," prosecutor Tashawn Sanders said. "The jury did a very deliberate and thorough job."</p><p>Jurors said they struggled over the issue of premeditation, finally concluding Quadra planned the attack.</p><p>After raping the woman with her 20-month-old son in the car seat behind them, he waited briefly and then attacked her with an ice pick, stabbing her 14 times.</p><p>"We really had a hard time concluding there was a pause," said a juror who identified himself only as Michael.</p><p>Another juror said the group talked at length about the meaning of premeditation.</p><p>Before reaching a verdict, the jury requested to hear the victim's testimony again. One juror said the information was so gripping she couldn't absorb it the first time.</p><p>"It was so riveting, we couldn't take our eyes off her," the juror said. "It's why we needed to hear it again."</p><p>The jury approved all but one sentence enhancement. It said the woman's injuries in the rape did not rise to the level of great bodily injury, which could have added several years to any sentence.</p><p>During the weeklong trial, Quadra's attorney didn't deny the defendant kidnapped the woman from the parking lot of the Yulupa Avenue Safeway and then raped and stabbed her.</p><p>But attorney Barry Collins asked jurors to be lenient on Quadra because he may have been too high on methamphetamine to have formed the premeditation necessary for the first-degree attempted-murder charge.</p><p>The jury was not convinced.</p><p>The victim, identified in court only as Jane Doe, testified that Quadra shoved her from behind into her SUV as she loaded her son into his car seat. She said Quadra was holding an ice pick and threatened the boy's life unless she complied with his demands.</p><p>She testified that Quadra forced her to drive to a secluded parking lot a few miles away, where he handcuffed her and raped her in the front seat while her son sat in the back seat.</p><p>Quadra then stabbed her repeatedly with an ice pick, stopping only when she was able to stomp on the car horn, causing him to flee.</p><p>Quadra was arrested three days later after a former co-worker identified him from a composite sketch based on the woman's description.</p><p>Sanders said Quadra would be sentenced to at least two life sentences -- one for the rape conviction and another for attempted murder.</p><p>The balance of his convictions plus enhancements could add at least 10 more years, she said.</p><p>Collins said Quadra likely will get a much longer sentence that will keep him behind bars virtually forever.</p><p>"He's never going to be eligible for parole," Collins said. "If he is, he'll be 90 years old."</p><p>You can reach Staff Writer Paul Payne at 762-7297 or paul.payne@pressdemocrat.</p><p>com.</p>