By Sarah Abfalter
The trial began Monday, January 11, in the case of Edward D. Hendrix, a 48-year-old Woodland man accused of inappropriately touching a 12-year-old girl when the two were alone waiting for his longtime girlfriend to arrive, who was also the girl’s cheerleading coach.
According to Deputy District Attorney Michelle Serafin, the girl was victimized and taken advantage of by Hendrix when she was staying overnight in the defendant’s home in order to attend a cheerleading event the next day with her coach.
In her opening statement, Serafin claimed that around 7:00pm or later on October 10, 2014, the alleged victim arrived at the defendant’s home with her grandmother, expecting to meet her coach but instead meeting the defendant, who had just pulled into his driveway. After the defendant’s girlfriend was called and notified of their arrival, the girl’s grandmother left, and shortly thereafter is when the incident allegedly occurred.
In order to illustrate the incident, Serafin showed the jury a long chain of text messages that were sent by the alleged victim to a close friend immediately after the incident. In the text messages the alleged victim claimed that Hendrix, who was not wearing a shirt at the time, sat down beside her on the couch and began a conversation that included inappropriate sexual remarks and offers of intercourse. The alleged victim claimed that, despite telling Hendrix no, the defendant hugged, kissed and groped her. The alleged victim also claimed in the text messages that Hendrix seemed intoxicated and was slurring his words.
According to the prosecution, after the incident occurred, the defendant’s girlfriend arrived home and the alleged victim was picked up shortly after by a friend’s mother, but did not tell anyone what had happened until the next day.
Deputy Public Defender Daniel Hutchinson, however, had a much different account of what really transpired in Hendrix’s home on the evening of October 10. According to Hutchinson, the victim in this case is not the young girl at all, but, in fact, is Edward Hendrix.
According to the defense, none of the events happened at all. Hutchinson pointed out to the jury that Hendrix is an African-American man, as they could obviously see. He also explained that the alleged victim is a young white girl, and he explained to the jury that, in fact, the alleged victim had repeatedly made racist remarks and ridiculed African-American people on her Instagram.
One of the worst offenses, explained Hutchinson, was a conversation on Instagram between the alleged victim and a friend, where the alleged victim pretended she was an African-American man in order to insinuate how African-American men act. The remarks made reference to the size of their penises and characterized African-American men as over-sexualized and aggressive.
The defense went further in explaining that the alleged victim repeatedly made use of the N-word on her Instagram account and claimed that one witness, an ex-boyfriend of the alleged victim, will testify to the fact that she uses this word regularly in her everyday life.
Based on this evidence, Hutchinson proclaimed to the jury that “what is unclear in this case is whether the victim actually believes what she said” because of her racial prejudice against black men.
Serafin had previously claimed during her opening argument that in fact the alleged victim, and lots of young people, use the N-word as a greeting, and not with the intent to offend.
Hutchinson went further to point out other portions of the story that Serafin did not include. One of those facts was that the alleged victim claimed the incident happened when she was alone in the home with the defendant. However, when the girlfriend was called to notify her of the alleged victim’s arrival, she was just down the street and it was only a few short minutes before she arrived home. These few minutes constitute the time in which the entire incident supposedly occurred.
Hutchinson also told the jury that, when questioned about the defendant’s state when she arrived at the home, the alleged victim’s own grandmother responded “there is no way that man was drunk.” Hutchinson pointed out the improbability that a man of Hendrix’s size could become, in a short time, so drunk that he was slurring his words, such an incident would occur, and he would then again appear sober when his girlfriend and her two daughters arrived home just minutes later.
“The allegations in this case are not based on what actually happened that day. The allegations in this case are based on [the victim’s] own belief about how black men that look like Edward Hendrix behave and act,” said Hutchinson.
Another fact that was pointed out by the defense was the lack of investigation by police in this case. According to Hutchinson, Detective Maribel Cortes, the detective assigned to this case, only spoke with three people prior to arresting Hendrix, not including Hendrix himself, despite his repeated offers of full participation in the investigation. Even more damaging to the case is that, according to Hutchinson, when asked why further investigation was not done, Detective Cortes responded simply, “I have a lot of other cases.”
Lastly, Hutchinson continued to point out additional facts that may raise suspicion with some jurors about whether or not the alleged victim was truthful. Several witnesses will be called to testify to the alleged victim’s demeanor the day of the incident and the day after, including the assistant coach of the cheerleading squad who was the first adult notified of the incident. According to the assistant coach, the alleged victim’s demeanor regarding the incident “seemed forced, like she was trying to seem upset.”
Hutchison closed his arguments by saying that the jury would hear from many different people who know Hendrix personally and within the community, and those people will tell them that “the idea that that man (pointing to Hendrix) would try to have sex with a 12-year-old girl is absolutely absurd… this case is about a troubled girl looking for the wrong type of attention.”
Alleged Victim Takes the Stand
By Haroutun Bejanyan
On January 13, 2016, Edward D. Hendrix sat before a jury, with defense attorney Dan Hutchison by his side, accused of molesting a 12-year-old cheerleader from Lee Middle School in Woodland, CA.
The alleged victim’s grandmother and the alleged victim herself, who is now 14 years old, were the prosecution’s witnesses for the afternoon. Both the prosecution as well as the defense each probed the alleged victim’s grandmother, Ms. Z, to piece together the chain of events that led up to the alleged incident on Friday night, October 10, 2014.
The prosecution’s questioning of the alleged victim aimed to fill in any gaps still remaining from Ms. Z’s recollection of the incident.
Ms. Z would usually drive her granddaughter to practices, as well as to the games at which the junior cheerleading squad would perform. However, on this particular Saturday, October 11, she would be unable to drive her granddaughter to the game.
So instead, Ms. Z arranged with the cheerleading coach, also the defendant’s girlfriend, Coach S, for her granddaughter to spend Friday night at the coach’s house so she could have a ride to the game on Saturday morning.
That Friday night after 8pm, Ms. Z drove her granddaughter to the coach’s house, but Coach S was not home. While they were waiting outside the house, the coach’s boyfriend, Edward Hendrix, pulled into the driveway.
He said that Coach S would be home soon, then dialed her number and handed the phone to the alleged victim. Over the phone, Coach S told the victim she was driving home from Woodland High School, that she would be there in a few minutes, and to tell Mr. Hendrix she loved him very much.
Mr. Hendrix invited both the alleged victim and her grandmother into the house to wait for the arrival of Coach S. He told them to make themselves at home, then exited the living room and went to his room.
Ms. Z, the victim’s grandmother, responded to both the prosecution as well as the defense that no aspect of Mr. Hendrix, whether it be slurred speech, odor of alcohol or stumbling, indicated he was intoxicated. She strongly recalled that nothing suggested he was drunk at the time.
After establishing that her granddaughter was comfortable waiting for Coach S at the house, Ms. Z decided to leave.
Woodland High is a three-minute drive from the coach’s residence. According to Ms. Z, from the time her granddaughter hung up the phone with Coach S to the moment when she walked out the door, about three minutes had lapsed. Therefore, she figured Coach S would arrive soon thereafter.
Ms. Z did not lock the door behind her and she knew for certain that her granddaughter had a cellphone on her and would call in a moment’s notice if she needed her.
After leaving the coach’s house, Ms. Z stopped by Walmart and then returned home. It was not long after Ms. Z’s arrival home that the alleged victim was dropped off by her friend’s mom.
Ms. Z recalled her granddaughter’s demeanor, saying, “She didn’t seem scared and she wasn’t crying, but she was quiet.” When Ms. Z asked why she came back home, the alleged victim replied that Coach S and her boyfriend, Mr. Hendrix, were arguing and she didn’t feel comfortable in their presence.
The next day, the alleged victim did not express any reluctance to go to the game with Coach S.
Later that afternoon, the alleged victim’s mother, who lived together with her daughter and Ms. Z, received a phone call from Coach S. The alleged victim’s mother appeared infuriated after she got off the phone.
At the time, Ms. Z wondered what it was about the phone conversation that made the alleged victim’s mother so angry.
