PORTLAND (AP) - One of the most notorious serial rapists in Oregon could go free because a federal judge has ruled his lawyer did not provide adequate advice when he pleaded guilty more than 20 years ago.

Ronald Ray Weaver was known as the "T-shirt Rapist" because he broke into women's homes with a shirt pulled over his face.

Weaver was sentenced in 1983 to 70 years in prison after he was convicted for rapes in Multnomah and Clackamas counties.

But those convictions were overturned by U.S. Magistrate Janice Stewart, who ruled Weaver must be granted another trial or released from prison.

Although the state plans to appeal, the news has stunned Weaver's victims, who assumed their attacker would remain in prison. Prosecutors and detectives this week have tried to reach as many of Weaver's victims as they can find to tell them about the ruling.

"In 20 years, I have never had to do anything like this," said Greg Horner, chief deputy district attorney in Clackamas County. "We are essentially going to people and saying, you thought the system worked, and here we find out 22 years later that it's failed. That's a difficult message."

One of Weaver's victims assumed the Portland police detective who visited her Tuesday came to tell her that Weaver was about to be paroled. She never imagined his convictions had been overturned.

"My heart is beating fast," said the woman, who was attacked in her home July 10, 1982. "It just brings back bad memories. You kind of live in fear after this happens. It never goes away."

The decision has left prosecutors in Clackamas and Multnomah counties scrambling to piece together what evidence and police reports remain from two decades ago in case they have to retry Weaver.

Norm Frink, chief deputy district attorney for Multnomah County, said the state will pursue "every legal remedy we have." If that fails, he said, the state is prepared to put Weaver on trial.

In his motion to have his conviction thrown out, Weaver argued that his attorney, Nick Chaivoe, failed to tell him about the strengths and weaknesses of the state's case, that he failed to advise Weaver of the results of his plea negotiations with Clackamas and Multnomah counties, and that he failed to consider the possibility of an insanity defense.

In her ruling, Stewart wrote that Chaivoe was "understandably disappointed" with the $30 hourly fee he was paid for his work on the case, and by Weaver's disclosure that he was responsible for the attacks.

"Nevertheless," Stewart wrote, "these factors negated neither the mental defense available to (Weaver) nor counsel's duty to provide diligent and vigorous representation to protect the rights of the accused."

According to testimony by Chaivoe's former legal secretary, the lawyer was experiencing "economic hardship" when he represented Weaver. He took the case, she said, because "he could barely pay the rent for his office space." He also took a $2,000 loan from Weaver's mother.

Chaivoe died in 2000. According to Oregon State Bar records, he was the subject of 22 complaints from 1963 to 1998, when he resigned from the bar. All the complaints, including one filed by Weaver in April 1983, were dismissed, bar officials said.

Weaver, who lived in Troutdale at the time of his arrest in 1982, was a married father of two who worked at his father's truck driving school.

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Information from: The Oregonian