JURY EXPECTED TO GET ROHRER CASE TODAY

Author: RON AVERY, Daily News Staff Writer

Mimi Rohrer's lawyer says the case against her "hangs by a slim, gossamer thread." The prosecutor declares that the state has put all the pieces of the ''jigsaw puzzle" together and that the picture shows the defendant murdered her son.

Today, a jury in Camden will begin considering more than three months of testimony to decide whether a death that occurred nine years ago was accidental or murder.

Rohrer, 43, wife of the mayor of Haddon Township, N.J., faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted of second-degree murder in the May 28, 1975, death of her 2 1/2-year-old adopted son, Billy. The prosecution says the boy died from a pattern of abuse.

Yesterday, the lawyers summed up the case. Superior Court Judge David G. Eynon was to give his instructions to the jury this morning.

Yesterday, the lawyers took all day to sum up the case. Superior Court Judge David G. Eynon will give his charge to the jury this morning.

Raymond M. Brown, the Newark defense attorney whom Rohrer repeatedly tried to fire during the trial, delivered a caustic attack on the state's case.

Brown contended that "the state can't even prove the cause of Billy Rohrer's death."

"And if they can't prove to you that this child died of trauma, they've lost the case," he said.

Brown said the case against Rohrer was built on "fantasy, speculation and lies."

He called the state's expert medical witnesses "arrogant" and charged that "little gnomes" from the attorney general's office had persuaded witnesses to change their stories.

The defendant and her husband, banker William G. Rohrer, adopted Billy and a girl, Laura, in El Salvador, in early 1975. Three months later, Billy died of an apparent brain hemorrhage.

Brown said the boy came to the Rohrers "with a whole lot of problems," including minimal brain damage caused by malnutrition. He said Mrs. Rohrer was ''reaching out for help," but doctors who examined the boy were ''incompetent and missed the boat."

Deputy State Attorney General Anthony Zarrillo contended that three physicians who examined Billy said he was "basically healthy and normal."

Zarrillo said Dr. Elliot Gursky, a psychiatrist, found that Billy was normal.

"The person with the problems was the defendant," Zarrillo said. "She said he (Billy) wanted to have sex with her. He (Gursky) viewed that as losing touch with reality."

Zarrillo reviewed testimony of a relative and a nursery school teacher who said Billy showed fear of his mother.

"When a child runs to the furthest corner of the room and sits under a table in the fetal position, that's real, palpable fear," Zarrillo said, referring to testimony that the incident took place when Rohrer came to pick up her son at nursery school.

Zarrillo said the variety of bruises shown on the boy's body in autopsy photos pointed to child abuse.

Referring to physicians' statements that there were bite marks on the boy's face, Zarrillo said: "No child can administer a bite to his own cheek. Someone had to do it. He didn't do it himself."

Admitting that the case against Rohrer was circumstantial, Zarrillo said, ''The total picture, when all the pieces are fitted together, leads to only one conclusion - that the defendant murdered her son."

Brown said the cause of death was "still undetermined" and suggested pre- existing medical problems, including brain damage.

Before the summations, Rohrer decided not to allow the jury to consider the charge of manslaughter. The five-year statute of limitations on the crime has expired, but the defendant had the option of allowing the jury to consider it.