Man faces trial for alleged sexual harassment of girls

A 52-year-old man accused of sexually assaulting three girls in Riverside County and then fleeing to Guatemala, where he was arrested, will stand trial on nearly two dozen charges, a judge ruled Monday.

Santos Erasmo Garcia was arrested last September after police officials in Guatemala, working with U.S. federal and local authorities, tracked him down. He was extradited to Riverside County.

After a preliminary hearing on Monday, Superior Court Judge John Monterosso found there was sufficient evidence to justify a trial on 16 counts of lewd acts with a child and six counts of aggravated sexual assault of a minor, as well as aggravated charges of deliberately demanding multiple victims in a sex crime.

The judge scheduled an arraignment after the preliminary hearing at the Southwest Justice Center in Murrieta on July 1. Garcia is being held without bail at the Smith Correctional Facility in Banning.

According to court documents, the victims, identified only as “JH,” “LR,” and “MR,” were allegedly abused between September 2010 and April 2017.

A sheriff’s warrant said one of the girls told investigators Garcia forced her to have sex and sexually abused her more than once when she was between 8 and 12 years old. The child described an alleged incident in which he threw her on a bed, held her down and kissed her neck until she screamed, then let her go.

There were also times when he was out with the girl and stopped to grope her, telling her to cooperate or he might not get a new cell phone, the affidavit said.

The document alleges that Garcia attempted to have sexual intercourse with her and force her to perform oral sex when she was just 12 years old.

The second victim claimed she had her first experience with Garcia at age five, when he touched her genitals, investigators said. He also tried to penetrate her when she was seven and a few times when she was 10 or 11, court records allege.

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