An Anaheim man was sentenced Friday to 25 years to life in prison for sexually assaulting two boys and creating and possessing child pornography featuring the victims.
Oscar Manuel Vaquera, 39, was living in a bedroom of an Anaheim house with other people who rented rooms there when he drilled a hole in his closet to secretly photograph and videotape the young boys as they used the restroom, Deputy District Attorney Jess Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez advocated the maximum punishment — 43 years to life — based on the defendant’s age.
“I wanted more than 25 years because he’s young enough to re-offend” if granted parole and released from prison, Rodriguez said outside the courtroom. Taking into account credit for time served, Vaquera will be about 62 years old if he’s granted parole on his first try, the prosecutor noted.
The crimes occurred between 2007 and early 2012.
Vaquera molested an 11-year-old boy while he slept overnight at the home and videotaped the act, Rodriguez said. Investigators may not have ever found out about that attack if the victim had not been looking at the defendant’s computer the next morning and saw images of himself being molested, Rodriguez said.
“He had no memory of it,” Rodriguez said of the victim.
Vaquera did the same to another boy when he was between 9 and 11 years old, except the child was awake at the time, according to Rodriguez.
Anaheim police, who were investigating peer-to-peer file-sharing websites, traced child pornography posted on a site back to Vaquera’s computer, Rodriguez said.
Vaquera used a cellphone and digital camera to make the recordings, the prosecutor said, adding that the defendant recorded himself molesting one victim as he showed the boy pornography on his cell phone.
At his sentencing, the defendant apologized to his family, the judge, and the attorneys, but not the victims, Rodriguez said.
Vaquera was convicted June 19 of two counts each of lewd acts on a child younger than 14 and possession of child pornography and one count of distributing child pornography, and jurors found true sentence-enhancing allegations of lewd acts against more than one victim and substantial sexual conduct with a child.
—City News Service