By Roselyn Poommai
SACRAMENTO, CA – A stepfather of two children faces trial on 14 counts of alleged sexual abuse, including forcible lewd and lascivious acts with a minor—his stepdaughter—after his preliminary hearing in Sacramento County Superior Court Wednesday.
On numerous occasions over three years, defendant Joshua C**** (last name withheld to protect the identity of the victim) had allegedly been committing sexually inappropriate acts involving his stepdaughter, Ms. Doe, since she was just five years old.
C**** was married to the victim’s mother during the three-year period and regularly supervised Ms. Doe and her brother while their mother worked.
Deputy District Attorney Quirina Orozco called Detective Bobi Griggs to the witness stand, who said he trained Ms. Doe’s mother to make a pretext phone call in an attempt to receive a confession from the defendant.
After the defendant denied all allegations over the initial pretext call, Griggs scheduled minimally intrusive SAFE (Special Assault Forensic Evaluation) interviews with the young victim and her brother.
However, days before the children’s interviews, C**** privately called the victim’s mother twice.
The defendant similarly denied all allegations during the first call but told Ms. Doe’s mother during the second call that he would admit to his acts “if she wanted.”
Griggs then decided to have Ms. Doe’s mother make a second pretext call to the defendant.
During the pretext call, C**** admitted to Ms. Doe’s mother that he forced the victim to touch him inappropriately and perform lewd acts.
Defendant C**** later stated that he “told her [the victim] he’d buy her whatever she wanted so she wouldn’t tell anybody.”
On the day of the SAFE interviews, Detective Griggs separately gathered information from Ms. Doe and her brother.
Ms. Doe, who was eight years old at the time of the interview, stated that her stepfather would regularly call her into his bedroom, lock the door, and “make her lie in bed with him.”
She recalled having been shown a pornographic video on one of those occasions, and how what he did to her made her cry.
Griggs then gathered information from Ms. Doe’s brother, who disclosed that he was frequently locked out of the bedroom whenever the defendant asked the victim to come into his room.
The victim’s brother recalled an instance where he repeatedly knocked on the bedroom door because he was hungry, but the defendant told him to find something to eat on his own.
Following the phone calls and interviews conducted, Detective Griggs was ultimately able to interview Defendant C****, wherein he admitted to the various sexual activities relayed by the victim.
He also admitted to substance use in that interview.
Judge James P. Arguelles determined that there was sufficient cause to move forward with C****’s case. The trial date is June 30.
Roselyn is a second-year undergraduate double-majoring in Psychological Science and Criminology, Law and Society at the University of California, Irvine. A native of Los Angeles, California, she is passionate about the role of human behavior in the criminal justice system.
To sign up for our new newsletter – Everyday Injustice – https://tinyurl.com/yyultcf9
Support our work – to become a sustaining at $5 – $10- $25 per month hit the link:
