12/07/2002

By AP Staff

A rape victim thinks she should receive the $10,000 reward for information leading to her alleged attacker's April arrest and indictment in the slaying of a 14-year-old girl whose body was found in the back yard of a Northeast Portland home last December.

But Crime Stoppers has given the money to a tipster who two months earlier gave police Ladon Andre Stephens' name, even though that tip did not lead to his arrest.

Stephens wasn't arrested until the April rape victim, Lakecia Banks, 24, reported her assault and identified him as her attacker. Once police arrested Stephens in April, they got a warrant to obtain his DNA. That sample matched evidence from Melissa Bittler's Dec. 13 killing and three 1997 rapes.

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"Ms. Banks was the key to identifying and apprehending Mr. Stephens," her attorney, James Zwaanstra, wrote to Crime Stoppers in October. "Her bravery and courage in coming forward should be rewarded."

The unidentified tipster who got the reward called police about 3 p.m. Feb. 13 and identified Stephens as the suspect in a composite drawing police released after Bittler's death.

But it took detectives two more months to make an arrest.

In an Oct. 18 letter to Banks' attorney, Crime Stoppers President Roger Williams wrote that because Banks did not provide information that Stephens might have been tied to other crimes, the Crime Stoppers board of directors determined that the reward should go to the February caller. The board consulted with Portland police Cmdr. Jim Ferraris, head of the detective division, and homicide detail Sgt. Ed Brumfield before making that decision.

Banks' attorney responded with a letter this week, asking for reconsideration and a share of the reward money for his client.

"The root of my concern comes from the fact that someone had apparently identified Mr. Stephens in February from a composite drawing but nothing was done until my client suffered at the hands of Mr. Stephens in April," wrote Zwaanstra, a Hillsboro lawyer. "It is our position that Ms. Banks was equally as responsible for the identification and apprehension of Mr. Stephens as the person who identified Mr. Stephens in February."

Homicide Detective John Brooks, the lead investigator in Bittler's killing, said the February tipster was the first to provide police with Stephens' name. He said police were trying to obtain Stephens' DNA through his parole officer, but Stephens was avoiding his parole officer. DNA was not obtained until Stephens allegedly struck again, and after his arrest in the April rape.

"You kinda hate to tell her 'no,"' Brooks said. "But someone came forward in February."

Crime Stoppers is a nonprofit organization made up of community volunteers. Its policy is to provide reward money for information reported to Crime Stoppers that leads to an arrest in an unsolved felony.

(Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)