Fifth victim testifies to alleged assault

The fifth alleged victim to come forward in the sexual assault trial of an ex-Anchorage police officer testified Wednesday that she met the officer after she woke up in an alcohol sleep-off center one day in September 2008 thinking she may have been raped by a different man the night before.

She'd been reported missing, and after a hazy night of drinking downtown, she collected her belongings from the front counter at the Community Service Patrol. The then 22-year-old woman was still wondering what had happened when Officer Anthony Rollins arrived to take her home, saying "that's her" as he walked in, she testified.

Rollins, 43, is charged with sexually assaulting six women between 2006 and 2009. The 13-year Anchorage policeman also faces charges of official misconduct and illegal use of a computer. He's pleaded not guilty to all charges.

So far, five women have testified that Rollins forced them to have sex or perform sex acts while he was in uniform and on-duty as a police officer. The Daily News does not identify victims of sex crimes unless the victims allow it.

After the fourth alleged victim finished her testimony Wednesday, most of which was given in Spanish and translated by an interpreter, the woman whom Rollins met at the sleep-off center took the witness stand at about noon.

"Was that a low point in your life?" asked assistant district attorney Brittany Dunlop about the woman's feelings that day, Sept. 5, 2008.

"Yes," she said.

"How did you feel when you woke up at CSP?"

The young woman started to cry.

"I don't have the words to describe it," she said. "Pretty sure I'd been raped."

The woman testified she'd gone to the Gaslight Lounge on Fourth Avenue to inquire about a job as a cocktail waitress. She'd just completed the training required to serve alcohol, she said.

The manager she needed wasn't there, so she walked across the street to Avenue Bar, where a man bought her several shots of liquor. She said she felt drunk after the first three drinks.

"I guess I didn't use my good judgment," she said. "I don't remember how much I had to drink."

She was playing pool and drinking a beer. The last thing she said she remembered was standing outside. The man who'd bought her drinks was in a cab telling her to get in, she said.

She woke up the next day confused at the sleep-off center. Her underwear and bra were missing. In walked Rollins, she said.

IN THE PATROL CAR

Rollins put her in the back of his patrol car and started toward her Mountain View home. As Rollins drove she told him she thought something had happened to her that night.

"He said, 'Something probably did happen to you,' and that was pretty much the end of that," she testified.

Rollins asked if she would ever do anything with him, which she took to be a sexual advance. The woman -- who, under Dunlop's questioning described herself as an "indirect" person -- told him "maybe if the situation were different," she said.

"I just have a hard time saying no," she said later.

Then he drove past her house, she said. She had a feeling he wanted to do something sexual with her, she testified.

"I just remember I wanted to go home," the woman said, her voice wavering. "I knew, 'I'll be OK if I just get home.' "

Rollins parked at the Mountain View substation and walked the woman inside, where she told him she wanted to go home and that her family was probably worried about her, she said.

She was also worried about herself, and she looked around the substation hoping there was a video camera, she said.

PRESSURED FOR SEX

Rollins started getting close, she said. Then he unzipped his pants and took out his penis, she said. He grabbed her hand and rubbed her hand on his penis for four or five seconds, she said. Then he turned her around and unzipped her pants, she testified.

"At that point, I didn't know what to say, and I just held my pants closed," she said. "He was still trying and I was still giving him excuses."

Rollins stopped after rubbing on her a few times, she said.

"I kept saying, 'If the situation was different.' In my head, I was thinking, 'I wouldn't do anything, not with him,' " she said.

She told him, "Maybe if I saw you a few more times," she said.

Rollins stepped out of the station, let the door close, then stepped back in. He did that a couple times, she said.

"There, you saw me a few more times," she recalled Rollins saying.

At some point in the car -- she couldn't remember if it was before the substation or on the way home after -- she told Rollins she might need to go to a hospital, and he told her that wasn't a good idea, she said.

She testified she thought Rollins had indicated he was worried about his DNA being found on her, she said.

Still, the woman took a taxi cab from her house to a hospital, where they gave her medication to ward off sexually transmitted diseases, she said. She didn't get an examination, she said.

Rollins called her a few times later asking to go to lunch, but she didn't respond and changed her phone number.

"I just wanted to forget," she said.

CASTING DOUBT

Earlier in the day, the court heard testimony from a woman who started her testimony Tuesday. She said Rollins masturbated and rubbed himself on her at the same Mountain View substation.

Rollins' defense attorney Susan Carney pressed the woman, who spoke mostly Spanish, about language issues, asking her about a complaint she'd filed regarding translating services provided during the investigation and her grand jury testimony.

Ultimately, state Superior Court Judge Philip Volland instructed jurors to disregard Carney's question about the complaint and any doubt it might have created.

Carney also disputed a statement the woman made about Rollins handing him her gun at the substation, something Carney said the woman failed to mention to detectives or the grand jury that indicted Rollins.

"He gave me the gun, it was heavy," she said through her interpreter.

Carney asked why she hadn't told detectives.

"Maybe the question wasn't completely asked, but that's what I said, that's what I've always said," she answered.

The questions then turned briefly to the alleged assault. Carney asked if Rollins had taken the woman's clothes off.

She said he had not. She said he had asked her to take them off, but didn't make her do it.