A 58-year-old man was convicted Tuesday of molesting seven sons of families he was friends with in Orange County.
Alex Mauricio Padilla Beltran was convicted of 23 felony charges related to sexual assaults on the seven boys. In total, prosecutors allege 11 victims, but some of those claims were used in the trial to show a pattern of abuse.
Beltran was scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 10. Jurors deadlocked on one felony count and it was dismissed.
Deputy District Attorney Tara Meath told jurors in her opening statement of the trial, “You’re going to hear disturbing things,” related to a “decade of abuse that this defendant put seven victims through.”
Beltran was friends with the families of three groups of victims, Meath said.
“Everybody loved him,” Meath said in her closing argument of the trial. “He bought ice cream, toys… He’s Uncle Alex.”
Beltran was “constantly touching these underage kids,” Meath said in her opening statement. “To the extent they would push him away.”
The defendant “took every opportunity he could” to molest the boys, the prosecutor said.
The first case was reported in 2003 to Orange County sheriff’s deputies, Meath said.
The boy said he was touched inappropriately whenever he visited his aunt’s home in Mission Viejo, and it started when he was 11, Meath said. It happened so often he lost count, but estimated about 15 times, according to the prosecutor.
The boy also said the defendant gave him $20 and told him not to tell anyone, Meath said.
“Not much came from that investigation,” the prosecutor said.
The next report of abuse happened in 2009 in Las Vegas where the defendant was renovating a house, Meath said.
Two brothers said the defendant molested them in September of that year when they went to the house to visit their father, who was working on the house, Meath said.
In court papers, Meath said Beltran pleaded guilty to a felony count of coercion and a misdemeanor count of conspiracy, and was placed on probation.
Another case was reported in January 2015 when one boy said he was molested at his father’s home in Orange County, Meath said. He said the abuse began when he was 6 to 8 years old, Meath said.
The boy’s brother also accused the defendant of molesting him, Meath said.
The boy were cousins of the first accuser, Meath said.
In September, 2017, another boy came forward with allegations, Meath said.
In April 2017, another boy came forward to Anaheim police reporting that when his son got in trouble for ditching classes at school he took him to a doctor for a drug test and the boy told the physician about the alleged abuse that started when he was about 10, Meath said.
In May 2017, another boy accused his godfather Beltran of molesting him, Meath said. That boy said he was concerned that the defendant also molested two of his cousins, according to Meath.
Another boy told investigators in May of that year he was molested by the defendant, Meath said.
The defendant’s attorney, Jacqueline Goodman, told jurors, “It all sounds very cut and dried. It isn’t.”
Goodman said the accusers are not unrelated.
“You’re going to see that, in fact, they are connected,” she said.
Goodman told jurors that the parents of one of the accusers had a volatile relationship that drew visits from child protective services. That prompted a hearing outside of the jury about what evidence could be provided during the trial regarding the child protective services allegations.
Goodman argued that because the boy’s parents divorced and the father remarried there were multiple instances of allegations back and forth, including a “false” claim that the boy was injured by the father.
“There was an extraordinarily volatile relationship between” the boy’s parents, Goodman told jurors.
The boy denied being sexually abused when asked by child protective services, Goodman said. The boy’s father has said in the past he did not believe his son was molested by the defendant, who was his close friend, Goodman said.
“I think (the boy’s mother) hated (her ex-husband) and his friend (the defendant),” Goodman said.
“There will be allegations that will be shown as demonstrably false,” Goodman said.
She noted that in one of the claims the boy said it was while they were watching a movie that had not been released at the time, Goodman said.
Goodman said there is a pending lawsuit brought by the accusers.