DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Courtesy of the New York Daily News
Her left eye still swollen under her snow white hair, 101-year-old Rose Morat told Thursday how a callous thief beat and attacked her inside her Jamaica, Queens, apartment lobby last year.
“I thought he was going to open the door, but then he hit me,” she said in a hearing set up to videotape the aging woman’s testimony – she turns 102 next month.
“Blood gushed out of my mouth … I thought, oh my God. I’ve been mugged.”
Jack Rhodes, 45, earned the city’s wrath after allegedly attacking Morat and 85-year-old Solange Elizee in the span of a few hours March 4, 2007.
A security video of Morat’s attack was widely circulated.
Morat had difficulty picking out Rhodes in the Queens Supreme Court courtroom yesterday. “It’s been a long time,” Morat said. “It could be a man like that.”
Rhodes was charged with burglary as a hate crime, along with robbery, assault and grand larceny charges for those attacks, as well as a prior attack on a 51-year-old Queens woman.
Rhodes’ lawyer could now use Morat’s inability to positively ID him when the case goes to trial – but the video and other victims’ IDs is considered strong evidence.
