Expert downplays alcohol connection in GHB rape trial

Kim Smith

Monday, Oct. 23, 2000 | 11:35 a.m.

A Las Vegas woman who accused a U.S. Marine of drugging and raping her last year was close to being legally drunk, but she did not have enough alcohol in her system to cause her to black out, a clinical pharmacologist testified during the Marine's trial.

Susan Kim, a clinical pharmacologist with the California Poison Control System, took the stand for the prosecution Friday during the sexual assault trial of Marine Lance Cpl. Raymond Flores.

Flores, 22, is the first person ever tried in Clark County for an alleged sexual assault that reportedly took place after the victim was drugged with the so-called date rape drug GHB.

Prosecutors allege Flores placed the drug into a shot of tequila and handed it to a single mother of three while at the Beach nightclub on Aug. 14, 1998.

The victim testified Wednesday she remembers nothing from the time she had the drink until she awoke nine hours later in a motel room with Flores.

Flores has denied raping the woman, and defense attorneys told jurors during opening statements that symptoms the woman displayed the following day were the result of a bad hangover.

On Friday Kim said that judging from what the alleged victim said she drank on that night and her height and weight, she probably had a blood-alcohol level of 0.088. People with blood-alcohol levels of 0.10 or more are considered legally drunk.

Most people don't begin suffering blackouts until they have a 0.30 blood alcohol level, Kim said.

Kim said blood and urine tests taken at the hospital didn't show GHB, and most hospitals don't test for similar drugs below certain levels.

However, the symptoms reported by the alleged victim -- dizziness, nausea, memory loss and muscle pain -- are what would be expected from GHB, Kim said.

Under cross-examination by the defense, Kim agreed that most victims stay unconscious only for about six hours, although she said alcohol can prolong the time.

Kim also conceded that her blood-alcohol level estimate was based on what the victim told her she drank that night.

Flores, who is stationed in Miramar, Calif., was in Las Vegas at the time of the alleged sexual assault participating in military exercises at Nellis Air Force Base. He has been reassigned to Nellis until the resolution of his case.