Victim Recalls Onset Of Assault Woman Details Events Leading To Fatal Beatings

A 20-year-old woman who survived a savage beating in a Spokane Valley home said she was clubbed once by accused murderer Dwayne Woods and has no other memory of what happened during the attack.

Venus Shaver, whose sister Telisha and friend Jade Moore died from similar head injuries inflicted by a baseball bat, told a Spokane County jury that Woods had come to the trailer home early on the day of the attacks, then refused to leave when she wanted to go to bed.

Shaver said she repeatedly screamed “Get out!” at Woods before he hit her on the head.

Woods, 27, is charged with two counts of aggravated murder for the killings of Telisha Shaver, 22, and Moore, 18.

He’s also charged with the attempted murder of Venus Shaver.

During her 75 minutes of testimony in the murder trial, the survivor angrily dismissed suggestions by Woods’ attorney that her memory of that night was shaped by others in the weeks after the attack.

Shaver said she and Moore agreed to spend the night of April 27, 1996, at the trailer of an aunt who was out of town. The night before the attack, Shaver said Moore wanted to buy marijuana from Woods, prompting them to call his pager several times.

When Woods came to the home just before 4 a.m., Moore was asleep and could not be roused, Shaver testified.

At that point, Woods became angry, she said. Several minutes later, after saying he was going to call a cab, he tried to sexually assault her, Shaver said.

She resisted and he slammed her head against a door, she said. During points of her testimony, Shaver breathed deeply, looking down while speaking.

She said she retaliated by punching Woods in the head. She crossed the room and demanded “about 10 times” that he leave.

“The last thing I remembered was him coming up to me,” she said. Her next clear recollection is waking up in a Spokane hospital several days later.

She spent nine days recovering from eight stab wounds and severe head injuries requiring more than 20 stitches.

Prosecutors in the trial, expected to last through next week, say Woods became enraged at Shaver, beat her with an aluminum bat and left her for dead.

They say he then awakened Moore in another room, raped her, then struck her with the bat, found later by police inside the trailer.

By 9:30 a.m., Telisha Shaver arrived at the trailer, surprising Woods, prosecutors say. They say Woods also beat her on the head with the bat, then tied her hands behind her back, leaving her to die.

Woods denies committing the murders, saying he was not at the trailer home during the attack.

Shaver said she first met Woods in January 1996 while she worked as a clerk at the Valley Hastings store. They became friends but were not involved in a relationship in April when the killings occurred.

Defense attorney Richard Fasy tested Shaver’s recollection of the attack and suggested her memory of that night might have been assisted by newspaper and TV stories during her recovery.

To a suggestion Shaver had been prompted by her family, the witness snapped, “No, they did not. I always remembered what happened.”

Fasy asked if she read newspaper stories while in the hospital. “I don’t remember any of the time in the hospital,” Shaver insisted, with a tinge of anger.

How did Woods appear as he approached her that last time, Fasy asked.

“Normal. He looked at me with a straight face. He wasn’t angry,” she said.

She testified that she has occasional “flash” memories of moments that she believes happened to her during the attack.

“When I get ready to go to sleep, when I’m relaxed, I get them.”

Those memories, she said, include having her head banged against the floor, and of Woods holding a bat and trying to push his way through a door into the bedroom while she’s inside, trying to keep him out.

In testimony on Monday, the prosecution is expected to introduce the results of DNA testing on the victims.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo