A Bell Gardens man who sexually assaulted his former live-in girlfriend’s teenage daughter in Santa Ana and eventually married and impregnated her was sentenced Friday to four years and four months in prison.
Garcia, who received the maximum sentence available for his conviction on three counts of lewd acts on a minor, will have to register for the rest of his life as a sex offender, Senior Deputy District Attorney Whitney Bokosky said.
The rape charge was dropped because prosecutors ran the risk in a retrial of being allowed only to tell a jury about evidence from that day and excluding any evidence related to the other allegations, Bokosky said.
The victim was 15 when she was reported missing in August 2004 by her mother, who suspected Garcia, her one-time live-in boyfriend, of abducting her daughter. The mother also suspected at that time that Garcia had been sexually abusing the teen for about two months, according to police investigators.
Garcia met the girl in February 2004 and would buy her gifts and take her side when the teen quarreled with her mother, according to Bokosky, who said Garcia molested and kissed the girl between June and August 2004.
Garcia was accused of forcing his captive into marriage in 2007 and had a child with her in 2012. The victim said she took pills to enhance her fertility during her time with Garcia, Bokosky said.
According to Garcia’s attorney, Seth Bank, there was also evidence that the young woman had talked with her girlfriend about how she wanted to get pregnant, and then how excited she was to be having a baby.
Garcia’s attorney contended that the girl had multiple chances to leave the defendant over the course of 10 years and go to authorities, but didn’t do so.
Bank indicated that the allegations might have stemmed from the couple’s split.
“It reminded me of friends or other people I know in relationships going through a divorce,” Bank said. “Everything becomes the other person’s fault.”
Bank also said there is a “huge cultural difference where my client grew up in rural Mexico” as to whether it is appropriate to make romantic advances toward a 15-year-old girl.
In Mexico, a 15-year-old can “make adult decisions, get married and is very independent,” Bank said.
The worst consequence may be that Garcia, who is not in the country legally, will be deported and may not be able to continue his relationship with the couple’s 3-year-old daughter, Bank said.
“I think the prospects of him maintaining that relationship are poor,” Bank said.
Babysitters and others testified that Garcia was a “doting and very affectionate father,” his attorney said.
The girl contacted her sister through Facebook on her birthday in April 2014, marking the first time her family had heard from her in years. A domestic dispute involving her and Garcia in Bell Gardens led to the suspect’s arrest, police said.
During the trial, Orange County Superior Court Judge Michael Leversen refused to grant the prosecution’s request to have former kidnapping victim Elizabeth Smart-Gilmour testify as an expert witness.
Bokosky argued that Smart’s abduction in Utah bore similarities to the alleged kidnapping in Garcia’s case. He argued that in both cases, the victims did not take advantage of multiple opportunities to escape their captors because of threats.
Bank argued that Smart’s fear of the consequences of escaping were far more considerable. Smart testified that her abductors consistently threatened to kill her and her family if she tried to get away.
Smart’s story became the subject of a made-for-TV movie, and she co-wrote a best-selling book about her experiences. Smart said her experience was much like the alleged victim in Garcia’s case.
“She was being manipulated and held hostage by verbal chains as opposed to physical chains,” Smart testified out of the presence of the jury.
The threat of deportation and then later the fear of losing custody of her child were the prime discouragement from seeking escape, Smart testified.
— City News Service