Thread: Man charged in rape, kidnapping writes from jail of threats,

http://www.wacotrib.com

Man charged in rape, kidnapping writes from jail of threats, forgiveness


Sunday, July 16, 2006

By Mónica Ortiz Uribe

Tribune-Herald staff writer

MEXIA — Javier Guzman Martinez, charged with last month’s rape and kidnapping of an 18-year-old Tehuacana woman, writes in a letter from the Limestone County Jail that he has failed his family and wishes he could talk to his mother to ask forgiveness.

Martinez, who turned 18 last week, arrived in the U.S. illegally about a year ago from Mexico City, according to his aunt, who lives here and received his letter. He could face life in prison if convicted of the June 28 attack, which shocked many Central Texans, especially those in largely rural Limestone County.

Residents still speculate how or why such an attack was committed.

Martinez’s aunt, Alicia Ramirez, says she wonders the same thing. She and her family settled in Mexia three months ago after leaving their native Guanajuato, Mexico.

“I don’t know what happened to him,” she said. “He must have gone crazy or let the beer get to his head. Maybe he was possessed by the devil.”

The Limestone County Sheriff’s Office says the Tehuacana teenager was kidnapped, raped and, according to complaint affidavits, cut with a piece of broken glass or “other unknown object” while being driven around the county during the pre-dawn hours of June 28.

Martinez and 22-year-old Noel Darwin Hernandez, both of Mexia, are in the county jail. Each is charged with one count of aggravated kidnapping and one count of aggravated sexual assault. Bond for each charge has been set at $1 million for each man.

On Wednesday, the day after she received Martinez’s jailhouse letter, Ramirez said she thought of contacting Martinez’s family but didn’t have a phone number to reach his mother in Mexico City.

Suspected gang activity

The last day Ramirez saw her nephew was June 27, when he stayed in her home. She said he slept on her couch occasionally but normally drifted in and out of several places.

About noon, she heard a car honk outside. Ramirez said she knew who the driver was the second Martinez jumped up from the couch.

“El Salvatrucha,” she said, referring to Hernandez’s alleged nickname. The nickname evokes part of the name of a violent street gang, Mara Salvatrucha, better known as MS-13. The gang originated in El Salvador and found its way into the United States through refugee immigrants from the Salvadoran civil war.

Hernandez is from neighboring Honduras. He is also in the U.S. illegally, according to law enforcement officials.

When he came by Ramirez’s home and honked for Martinez to join him, Martinez’s aunt tried to dissuade her nephew.

“Don’t go,” she told him. “You have to rest and go to work tomorrow.”

She had warned him many times not to hang out with “El Salvatrucha,” she said. But he ignored his aunt.

“I’m leaving, tía,” he said, patting his younger cousin on the head and disappearing out the door.

Ramirez says that the next time she saw her nephew was in a mug shot broadcast on TV news.

As far as she knows, he’s never been in trouble with the law before, she said.

Martinez signed his letter with “Chilango 100%” — slang for “100 percent Mexico City native.”

Next to it he wrote “Sur 13,” a reference to a gang originally from south Los Angeles, which has spread and become one of the most dangerous in the United States, according to Doran Belknap, who handles gang intelligence for McLennan County’s Juvenile Probation Department.

Limestone County Sheriff Dennis Wilson has told the Tribune-Herald that officials are investigating whether the men have been involved in similar assaults. However, he has refused to discuss whether Martinez or Hernandez had a criminal history or were involved in gangs.

On the evening of June 28 an anonymous tip from a woman led Limestone County authorities to Martinez. According to Wilson, Martinez admitted to being involved in an attack on a woman early that morning.

Wilson said the woman was abducted by two men from her sport utility vehicle on her way home to Tehuacana, a town of about 300 just northwest of Mexia. The men forced her into their car where they sexually assaulted, beat and cut her, according to the affidavits.

The ordeal went on for about two hours while the men drove up and down county roads, Wilson said.

Afterward, the men left her for dead on the side of a farm road about eight miles from where she lived, Wilson said.

After the attackers drove off, the woman managed to crawl and stagger a half-mile to the nearest home where she got help from volunteer firefighters who live there, Wilson said.

When Limestone County authorities interviewed Martinez the evening after the attack, he told them Hernandez had also been involved, Wilson said. Martinez also told them Hernandez was en route to a Waco bus station to flee the area.

That evening, U.S. marshals, at the request of Limestone County authorities, stormed the downtown Waco Transit bus station and arrested Hernandez 45 minutes before he could board a bus bound for Mexico, Supervisory Deputy Marshal Dan Phillips said.

“He was sitting next to a young woman in the lobby talking,” Phillips said.

Phillips said the woman later told them she had just met Hernandez and thought he was “a nice guy.” Phillips said the two would have been traveling on the same bus.

A neighbor speaks

A neighbor of Hernandez, 21-year-old Alfredo Ranjel, said the two of them would occasionally go riding around town or drinking together.

Speaking over hip-hop music blaring from his car stereo, Ranjel said he thought Hernandez had been in Mexia for about a year and may have gotten some traffic tickets, perhaps a DWI.

A girlfriend came and lived with Hernandez for a month, then left, he said.

Ranjel said he knew the Tehuacana woman from high school. She graduated from Mexia High School this year, a year after he graduated.

“I don’t think he (Hernandez) knew her,” he said.

Sheriff Wilson has said the attack victim didn’t know the two men.

Martinez and Hernandez worked together in a Mexia Mexican grocery store called Mi Tierra Meat Market. The neatly kept store opened four months ago and is stocked with colorful produce, all the latest Tele-Novela magazines and leather cowboy belts.

‘Good workers’

Owner Mauricio Torres said the two men now in custody worked as cashiers.

“They were good workers,” he said. However, Torres said he fired Martinez when he didn’t show up to work after reportedly waking up with a hangover. That was about a week before the assault, he said.

Torres said he didn’t know much else about the pair.

While investigators have continued to investigate the attack, residents in and around Mexia have sought to find a quiet, yet meaningful, way to express community sympathy for the woman and her family.

Ken Lane, pastor at the First Presbyterian Church, where the woman’s mother is a member, said locals agreed to hang purple ribbons outside area homes and businesses. Purple ribbons are traditionally used as a symbol to commemorate domestic violence.

“Our hope is that as she drives around town she will feel the community’s solidarity and support without its being intrusive,” he said.

The victim isn’t mentioned in Martinez’s jailhouse letter to his aunt. He writes instead about receiving death threats and how he believes they are serious.

He asks his family to find a way to get him out.

“I don’t want to die here,” he said.

mortiz@wacotrib.com

757-5751

" “Chilango 100%” — slang for “100 percent Mexico City native.” "

WRONG! "Chilango" is a term used by fellow Mexicans to degrade a person who is lazy, selfish, ignorant, and lives off the welfare and hand-outs of others. It's origin is from a type of fish, that sinks into mud, encased and protected, and survives until the next fertile rainy season, to once again live off the bounty provided!

Everytime an illegal, rapes, maims,and murders an american citizen, it should be laid at the feet of congress and our President.they have unleashed this vermin, I can think of no other name to call them by, on the citizens of this country. The story should be read on all news media outlets and every radio talk show out there. There should be some way to hold our government accountable for each and every crime these illegal rabid dogs committ. The family affected by these terrible crimes should file a lawsuit immediately against our government for the lack of protection and the lack of enforcement of our governments own laws to keep this kind of trash out of our country. I want these leaders to be held responsible for their failing to uphold our constitution to secure out borders, I don't give a dam if there is little chance of going to court, I just think they should be filed at least, jam the system whatever it needs to be laid squarely at the feet of our government!

MS-13 Gang a factor in ANOTHER Gang Rape of an American.

added to the homepage

http://www.alipac.us/modules.php?name=N ... e&sid=1357

“He must have gone crazy or let the beer get to his head.

Martinez, who turned 18 last week,

Unbelievable!

They left that girl in a ditch to die. Why aren't they being charged with attempted murder? This is wrong that they are not charged with that.

The victim isn’t mentioned in Martinez’s jailhouse letter to his aunt. He writes instead about receiving death threats and how he believes they are serious.

“I don’t want to die here,” he said.

Doesn't seem too remorseful does he? Time and time again it's me, me, me, me.