It was that simple, brutal logic, that one thought racing through his brain July 17, 1999, that led him to strangle the petite 17-year-old, Mr. Rivera said.

Differing from more than 200 other rape victims, Mrs. Dingess wasn't a prostitute like a woman he was accused of assaulting years before in Washington, D.C., a woman who didn't pursue charges in a case he beat.

After his first rape, ``I realized right there how easy it was ... to force yourself on them,'' Mr. Rivera said. He wanted that domination, that control, he explained to Richmond County sheriff's Sgt. Wayne Bunton and Investigator Richard Roundtree in a statement taped Oct. 14.

On Wednesday in Richmond County Superior Court, the tape recordings of that interview were played. Judge Albert M. Pickett must decide whether juries in Richmond and Columbia counties will hear the tape recordings during Mr. Rivera's two death-penalty trials.

``I never went out thinking the next person I rape I'm going to take her out,'' Mr. Rivera said. But that's what happened to Mrs. Dingess.

``She was so little, so easy (to rape),'' Mr. Rivera said. But he knew he couldn't just let her go afterward, he said.

Reflected in the marble walls of a Richmond County courtroom, Reinaldo J. Rivera heads into a holding cell under escort by court bailiffs. Mr. Rivera's pretrial hearing for death-penalty trials he faces in Richmond and Columbia counties continued Wednesday. JONATHAN ERNST/STAFF

The same went for his next area victim, Tiffaney Wilson, 17, on Dec. 4, 1999; and for Tabatha Bosdell, 18, on June 22; and for Army Sgt. Marni Glista, 21, on Sept. 4; and for the 18-year-old Augusta woman he intended to kill Oct. 10, he told the investigators.

He killed them, Sgt. Bunton said, because he was afraid of getting caught.

Mr. Rivera told detectives he lured the women into trusting him and convinced them he would pay them if they allowed him to photograph them.

``You wouldn't recognize me around girls. I have it down pat. I know exactly what to say,'' he said.

Sgt. Bunton pressed Mr. Rivera on that point, explaining that some people who knew the victims found it hard to believe they could be so naive. Mr. Rivera responded, ``They were all naive to leave with a stranger after 30, 35 or 40 minutes (of conversation.)''

The 18-year-old survivor who identified Mr. Rivera as the man who raped, strangled and stabbed her told detectives she had fallen for Mr. Rivera's lies. Her survival and ability to describe her attacker led to a composite sketch and Mr. Rivera's arrest.

Mr. Rivera saw the composite drawing published in the newspaper in October and left his family's North Augusta home and checked into a Clearwater hotel. Investigators found him at 4 a.m. Oct. 12 with cuts on his left wrist and arm and a belt around his neck. He apparently had attempted suicide by taking most of a bottle of Tylenol P.M.

Dr. Amy Blanchard took over Mr. Rivera's care that morning, after he was transferred out of the Medical College of Georgia Hospital emergency room, she testified. The ER doctors already had pumped his stomach and administered medication to counter the potentially deadly effects of a Tylenol overdose, Dr. Blanchard testified Wednesday. They also had put Mr. Rivera on a respirator, mainly to protect his airway from regurgitation, she testified. The respirator was removed that afternoon.

Dr. Amy Blanchard testifies about the treatment Mr. Rivera received at Medical College of Georgia Hospital after his apparent attempt at suicide in October. JONATHAN ERNST/STAFF

The cuts to the wrist and the inside of Mr. Rivera's elbow were not life threatening, Dr. Blanchard testified, and no bruising or injury was noted on Mr. Rivera's neck. The Tylenol overdose could have killed him, she testified, but by Oct. 14 he was well enough to be released from the hospital.

Cross-examined by defense attorney Jacque Hawk, who is representing Mr. Rivera with attorney Peter Johnson, Dr. Blanchard testified Mr. Rivera was quiet and tearful during his stay at the hospital.

It was clear Mr. Rivera was lucid by the time detectives gathered for a interview with her patient Oct. 13, the physician said under questioning by Assistant District Attorney Ashley Wright. Dr. Blanchard testified that she asked Mr. Rivera that day whether he wanted to talk to the officers and that Mr. Rivera told her ``yes.''

``I wanted to assure myself that he hadn't been forced; that's why I asked him,'' she said.

Judge Pickett said Wednesday he is convinced Mr. Rivera's statements Oct. 13 and the next day were voluntary and, therefore, admissible at trial. The problem, however, is the quality of the tape recordings. A second set of original tapes will be played at the next hearing and might solve that problem, the attorneys and judge agreed Wednesday.

Mr. Rivera has been held in jail without bond since his arrest. Trial dates in Richmond and Columbia counties have not been set. Mr. Rivera has been charged but not yet indicted in Aiken County in the deaths of Mrs. Wilson and Mrs. Dingess.

Reach Sandy Hodson at (706) 823-3226.