GRAND RAPIDS, MI - As the 85-year-old rape victim left the courtroom using her walker and surrounded by family, she put a hand up to her face and began to weep.

It was the first time that she showed any sign of emotion as she described the horrific sexual assault by the man who she said burst into her Grandville home - the man she identified as 51-year-old Shawn Jarrett.

She took the stand as one of the first witnesses on Tuesday, Feb. 17, in the Kent County Circuit Court trial of Jarrett, who is charged with first-degree criminal sexual conduct and home invasion. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted.

She said Jarrett came to her home in the late morning of a "beautiful, beautiful day" on June 19 after she had her grandson at the home where she and her husband had lived since 1963. Her husband died about a decade ago, leaving her to live alone at the home.

She said the man asked her about the Prairie Street SW area and whether it was a good neighborhood for the family he was thinking of bringing to Grandville. She then let him use her cordless phone.

But when she went to get the phone back, he burst through the door and pushed her to the ground and began hitting her.

"I was screaming, 'Don't do this, please don't do this,'" the woman testified.

As she struggled with her attacker, he told her he would go away if she gave him money.

But he did not leave after she gave him the five $10 bills she had in her purse, she said. The woman said Jarrett then dragged her into a bedroom.

He demanded oral sex from her, but she refused and so he hit her and then proceeded to sodomize her, she testified.

"I said 'You told me you'd leave,'" the woman said. "I was yelling at the top of my lungs."

"All I remember is that it hurt awful bad," the woman said.

After the assault, she said her assailant took her into the bathroom and forced her to wash off before he finally left.

She called 911 and within minutes police were on the scene.

Chief Assistant Kent County Prosecutor Christopher Becker asked the woman if she saw her rapist in the courtroom. She looked at Jarrett seated at the defense table and described what he was wearing.

"It definitely was him," the woman said.

Related: 'I didn't do anything,' says Shawn Jarrett, suspect in Grandville assault and Walker homicide

The woman's family watched from the gallery, wiping away tears even as the 85-year-old gave them a reassuring smile.

Defense attorney Steven Brunink elicited the fact that the woman initially said the man who assaulted her was between the age of 20 and 30.

In his opening statement, Becker told the jury that police matched semen found on a pillow at the woman's home to Jarrett, and that the DNA match meant there was only a one in 247-sextillion chance that it could belong to someone other than Jarrett.

Becker said there are witnesses and video from a Rapid Bus that place Jarrett near the Grandville home at the time of the assault.

Brunink asked the jury to keep an open mind and base their decision on evidence or lack of evidence and not on emotion.



Police say Jarrett is also the prime suspect in the homicide of Yolanda Reyes, a 40-year-old mother of four and co-worker of Jarrett found dead near a Walker construction site in May. Jarrett has not been charged in that case.

Jarrett spent 30 years in Pennsylvania prisons, 20 of which were for felony murder, according to court records.

The trial is expected to last the rest of the week.

E-mail Barton Deiters: bdeiters@mlive.com and follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/GRPBarton or Facebook at facebook.com/bartondeiters.5