Condition of Reseda Stabbing Victim, 74, Improves

The teen-age youth knocked on the door, then introduced himself and asked for a glass of water and use of a telephone.

Edith Rose didn’t know the boy personally, but she had seen him around her Reseda neighborhood.

According to police, once the youth was inside her home, he demanded money and when the 74-year-old widow refused, he attacked. First he punched her repeatedly, then he grabbed a butcher knife and chased her through the house, stabbing her 20 times, authorities said. When she finally collapsed in the kitchen, police said, the boy handcuffed her to a drainpipe.

The robbery netted less than $10 and some credit cards that investigators recovered in the trash can of a nearby convenience store.

Rose was found hours later, bleeding but still conscious, by a neighbor who crawled through an unlocked window looking for her.

“They brought her out to the ambulance, and just before they put her in I saw the remains of a handcuff on her left arm,” said Officer James LaForce of the Los Angeles Police Department. “I tried to take the handcuff off and I couldn’t. It was jammed up.”

The stretcher was lifted into the ambulance and LaForce jumped in behind it. “Do you know who did this?” he asked Rose.

At Northridge Hospital Medical Center--amid the noise of doctors and nurses working to save her life--he asked again.

“I asked her, ‘Who did this to you?’ ” LaForce said. “She gave me his first name, which I heard clearly, and the last name, which was kind of garbled.”

“I asked her if she knew where he lived,” LaForce said. “She said no, but that he lived somewhere in her neighborhood.”

The details led to the arrest of a 17-year-old neighbor at his job at a McDonald’s on Sherman Way in Reseda.

He faces charges of attempted murder, residential robbery and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Police plan to ask that the youth, whose name was withheld because he is a juvenile, be tried as an adult.

Rose’s condition had improved from critical to serious but stable by early Friday, and she was moved to an undisclosed location, said a Northridge Hospital Medical Center spokeswoman.

Detective Robert Johansen said that most of the stab wounds were superficial, but that Rose suffered a deep wound to her abdomen.

“There were also stab wounds to her hands, indicating she tried to push him away,” Johansen said.

Although they will not confirm whether the youth confessed, authorities say information he gave led investigators to a trash can at a 7-Eleven where Rose’s credit cards were discovered.

Johansen said he believes that the youth lived with his mother and sister on Wynne Avenue, about a block from the home on Strathern Street where Rose has lived for more than 30 years.

The suspect is something of a mystery in the neighborhood. Many people saw him riding his bike, but few had talked to him.

Neighbor Rick Kahana said the youth occasionally came by his house, asking for a beer or a ride.

“He was kind of a loner, kind of offbeat,” Kahana said. “He would just kind of pop in from out of nowhere and ask for beer.”

Once he asked Kahana, who teaches kick-boxing in his garage, to train him. When Kahana told him he needed to get his mother’s permission, the boy left and never again brought up the subject.

Rose, on the other hand, was a fixture in the well-groomed suburban neighborhood. Her house was known for blocks as a place where no one was turned away.

“She would take in everyone, anyone,” said Anthony Federico, 69, who has lived next door to Rose for 32 years.

Kahana, who lives around the corner, recalled how Rose helped neighbors haul bricks for damaged walls after the Northridge earthquake.

Jerry Andrews remembered how she stocked her refrigerator with beer for him when he came by to chat.

Louie Sprenzel said Rose always gave him rides to nighttime church functions because he is blind in one eye and cannot drive after dark. And when his wife was sick, she brought flowers from her garden.

Friends said Rose’s husband died 12 years ago of a heart attack.

Rose filled her days gardening, tending not only her own yard and flower beds but the ones at the New Apostolic Church across the street.

Once a month, the neighbors meet at a different restaurant to have dinner, and to catch up on each other’s lives. Recently, the subject was crime.

“We just talked about how dangerous it is getting, and how stupid (criminals) are for messing up their own lives by doing wrong,” Kahana said.