OXNARD : Parolee Charged in 2 Rapes at House

A man paroled from state prison just three weeks ago has been charged with two rapes--15 months apart--at the same Oxnard house.

Samuel Chester, 28, of Oxnard pleaded not guilty Thursday in Ventura County Municipal Court to multiple charges of rape, armed robbery and burglary. Judge Bruce A. Clark scheduled a May 11 preliminary hearing in the case.

Chester was paroled from prison April 7 after serving an eight-month sentence on an unrelated burglary charge. He was arrested early Tuesday, minutes after a 42-year-old woman reported she had been raped in her Joliet Street home.

Chester was in the midst of a lengthy crime spree, investigators said.

Police say he robbed a resident in the 900 block of Elder Street just after midnight, and then attempted to rob another house in the 1200 block of Astoria Place about 5 a.m.

“Officers were over there to respond to the one call on Astoria when they heard the call of the rape,” police spokesman David Keith said. “Joliet’s just two blocks away, so they raced over there and caught the guy.”

Police learned that the rape victim’s 70-year-old mother had been raped in the same house on Jan. 13, 1992, and identified him as a suspect in that assault.

Keith said fingerprints lifted after the 1992 rape were used to connect the crime to Chester, but had no explanation as to why he returned to the same area.

“That’s kind of a mystery to us,” Keith said. “For whatever reason he operates in that neighborhood and he went back to the same house.”

Chester pleaded not guilty to seven felony charges, including two counts of rape, three counts of burglary and two counts of armed robbery.