YOUNGSTOWN — A teen girl told a nurse at St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital in June of 2019 that Dustin Ruiter raped her for the first time the previous December after she “said no, and he hit me because I said no,” according to testimony Wednesday in Ruiter’s rape trial in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

The nurse, Christine Horvath, said that she asked the girl open-ended questions when the girl was brought into the hospital to have a rape kit performed: “What brought you to the hospital?” The girl said she had been raped the night before.

That information was important because that meant the rape had happened recently enough so that a rape kit could be performed, and that materials from the girl would be collected and placed in specific containers and turned over to police.

A nurse gives few “prompts” to an alleged sexual assault victim, Horvath said, adding, “We do a lot of listening.” Horvath said she wrote down “word for word” what the girl said, including that she had not showered after she had been raped the night before.

Horvath also examined a second girl who made allegations of being raped by Ruiter, Horvath said under questioning by Mahoning County Assistant Prosecutor Caitlyn Andrews. Horvath could not carry out a rape kit on that girl, however, because the last rape she talked about had been too long ago, Horvath said.

Under questioning by Ruiter’s attorney, James Wise, Horvath said she had carried out about 20 exams on individuals who alleged being raped.

Another witness Wednesday was McDonald police officer Brandon Caraway, who worked as an investigator of juvenile-related crimes for the Youngstown Police Department in 2019.

Caraway said he responded to an Austintown business June 18, 2019, because of two girls reporting allegations of sexual abuse to the owners of the business. It was a Youngstown police matter because they alleged the offenses occurred in Youngstown, he said.

He spoke with the two owners, but did not interview the girls because that is done by personnel at the Child Advocacy Center at Akron Children’s Hospital, he said. The girls were taken to the hospital in an ambulance so that a rape kit could be performed, he said.

One of the things he did was accept the rape kits when they were brought to the Youngstown Police Department from the hospital and took DNA swabs from Ruiter and sent the swabs to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation for “comparison” of other DNA evidence that was collected.

Under cross examination by Wise, Caraway confirmed that he had no “formal training” to be an investigator of juvenile matters such as rape allegations. Such training was not provided at that time, he said.

Ruiter is charged with 67 offenses related to two girls — 33 counts of rape, 21 of them the forcible rape of one girl. The other 12 are for the forcible rape of the other girl. Ruiter is also charged with one count of attempted rape, and 33 counts of sexual battery involving the same two girls.

The trial resumes today in the courtroom of Judge Anthony D’Apolito.