Doctor Tells of Treating Kraft for Injury : On Same Day in 1981, Victim Was Killed in Oregon, Jury Hears

Prosecutors in the penalty phase of the Randy Steven Kraft trial presented evidence Tuesday indicating that an Oregon doctor treated Kraft for an injury to his big toe on the same day in 1981 that a youth was killed nearby from blows to his head.

The youth, Michael Duane Cluck, 17, was one of the few victims linked with Kraft who was hit rather than strangled. Most of the victims, prosecutors have said, were too drugged to resist their attacker. Prosecutors theorize that Kraft probably injured his foot kicking Cluck in the back of the head.

Kraft, 44, convicted in Santa Ana last month of 16 Orange County murders, watched with pen in hand for note-taking as Deputy Dist. Atty. Bryan F. Brown used an overhead projector to show large-screen, color blow-ups of two victims found at crime scenes in Oregon.

Gruesome Photos From Scene

Kraft attorney C. Thomas McDonald sat with his back turned from the screen as jurors were presented with more than a dozen gruesome crime-scene photographs.

During the penalty phase of the trial, Brown has accused Kraft of six Oregon murders and two Michigan murders in 1980-82.

Jurors will decide whether to return a verdict of death or life without parole.

Their decision is more than just a recommendation to Judge Donald A. McCartin, who will impose the final sentence: If the jurors vote for death, the judge would have to set their verdict aside to give Kraft a lesser verdict of life without parole. No county judge has done that since the state’s current death-penalty laws were imposed in 1977 and 1978.

On Wednesday, the third day of the penalty phase, Brown presented evidence on the third and fourth victims from Oregon. He is expected to finish presenting evidence involving the Oregon victims today and to begin discussing the two Michigan victims Monday and Tuesday.

While most of the information presented to the jurors Wednesday has long been in court files, the information about Kraft’s toe injury was new.

Agreement by Attorneys

According to an agreement worked out between Brown and defense attorneys, jurors were told that on April 10, 1981--the same day that Cluck was found dead near Interstate 5 a few miles from Eugene, Ore.--Kraft told a doctor that he had stubbed his toe while turning off the TV in his motel room at 3 a.m.

Kraft told the doctor that he had been up watching news about that day’s space shuttle activities. The doctor reported that the toe was badly bruised and that he gave Kraft medication.

Judge McCartin told jurors that after Brown completes his case next week he will allow the defense to wait until July 17 to begin its case.