See the update at the bottom of Page 2 on Nazario Enrique Cruz-Sanchez today being convicted of sexually assaulting young female relatives of two separate live-in girlfriends.
ORIGINAL POST, APRIL 4, 7:09 A.M.: Nazario Enrique Cruz-Sanchez is accused of sexually assaulting 9-year-old and 12-year-old girls related to two separate live-in girlfriends, one of whom has been convicted of having encouraged the younger girl to look at porn, watch her and her boyfriend have sex and have sex with the Santa Ana man.
The defense claims both girls lied.
]
Nazario Enrique Cruz-Sanchez Raped 9 y.o. Girl as His Girlfriend Estela Garcia Watched: Cops
Brace yourselves, fair citizens. Here are seven things Deputy District Attorney Keith Burke alleged at Thursday's trial opening (courtesy of the courtroom report by City News Service's Paul Anderson):
* The first alleged incident with the 12-year-old, which happened in 2006, had 42-year-old Cruz-Sanchez making the girl watch as he showed her how “to put a condom on a man;”
* “Do you know what it's like to have a man make you feel good?” he told her another time before allegedly molesting her;
* Cruz-Sanchez allegedly told her not to tell his then-live-in girlfriend about the molestation that continued through 2007 because it could “jeopardize” her pregnancy;
* The 9-year-old girl is related to 30-year-old Estela Garcia, who pleaded guilty July 31 to encouraging the girl to engage in sex acts with her live-in boyfriend Cruz-Sanchez in
2010-12;
* Cruz-Sanchez and Garcia once allegedly exposed the girl to pornography and would have sex in front of her;
* Garcia claims she initially lied to investigators about her involvement in the sex abuse because she feared deportation and losing custody of her children. She later claimed Cruz-Sanchez threatened to leave her and discontinue any financial support if she
didn't have the girl perform sex acts on him. The adult woman was unemployed at the time.
* Cruz-Sanchez allegedly told Garcia that because she was not a virgin when they got together, she needed to have the 9-year-old have sex with him because his religion required it.
Ah, yes, the Church of Latter Day Creeps.
Garcia, who is expected to testify against Cruz-Sanchez, cut a plea deal that included a 20-year prison sentence.
Estela Garcia Guilty of Pairing Her Live-in Boyfriend and 9 y.o. Female Relative for Sex
But Cruz-Sanchez's attorney Jeremy Dolnick of the Orange County Alternate Defender's Office claims Garcia tried to withdraw her guilty plea and was blocked by the judge.
[
Dolnick says he will put a defense expert on the stand who will claim it is “absolutely ridiculous” that a planned prosecution expert will say the 9-year-old could have been sexually abused even though medical tests found no such evidence of that.
The defense attorney suggested that the 9-year-old's claims may have been prompted by her father, who was angry about having to pay child support. Dolnick noted she told investigators pictures were taken of her during the sexual assaults, but police found none. “You're going to hear inconsistent stories,” he told jurors.
Meanwhile, the 12-year-old was “resentful” over having been “left behind” in Mexico for six years to live with her grandparents and was also envious of two new “half-siblings,” which led to disobedience, drug and alcohol abuse and sometimes running away from home, according to Dolnick.
His client pleaded not guilty to two counts of having sex with a child younger than 10, four counts of oral sex with a child younger than 10 and nine counts of lewd or lascivious acts with a minor, all felonies.
UPDATE, APRIL 23, 3:12 P.M.: Nazario Enrique Cruz-Sanchez was convicted today of sexually assaulting young female relatives of two separate live-in girlfriends, one of whom has already been found guilty of encouraging her 9-year-old relative to go along with the abuse.
Jurors found Cruz-Sanchez guilty of two counts each of having sex with a child younger than 10, oral sex with a child younger than 10, sexual penetration of a child younger than 10 and lewd acts with a child younger than 14, while also finding true sentencing enhancements for multiple victims.
The 42-year-old now faces a minimum of 25 years to life in prison and a maximum term of 125 years to life at his scheduled June 27 sentencing.
His ex-girlfriend, Estela Garcia, acknowledged in her testimony that she tried to have withdrawn her July 31 guilty plea to encouraging her young relative to engage in sex acts with Cruz-Sanchez in 2010-12. But Garcia explained she only did so to get a better deal than her 20-year prison sentence, City News Service reports.
Email: mc****@oc******.com. Twitter: @MatthewTCoker. Follow OC Weekly on Twitter @ocweekly or on Facebook!
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.