Rape charges dropped against two immigrant Md. teenagers
They’re accused now of child porn for video girl sent
ROCKVILLE, Md. — Prosecutors are dropping charges against two Hispanic teens accused of raping a 14-year-old girl in a restroom at a suburban Washington high school, a case cited by the White House as an example of why the president wants to crack down on illegal immigration.
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said at a Friday news conference that the rape and sex offense charges were being dropped after a “painstaking investigation” of the girl’s claim that the two teens raped her in the bathroom at Rockville High School.
Defense attorneys said the sex was consensual. They pointed to text messages in which the girl agreed to a sexual encounter; an explicit video the girl sent one of the teens; and security camera footage, which they said shows the girl running to meet one of the teens and willingly entering the restroom with him.
Video triggers charges
McCarthy said the girl was interviewed multiple times and the investigation revealed a “lack of corroboration and substantial inconsistencies.”
“The original charges cannot be sustained, and prosecution is untenable on those charges,” McCarthy said. He refused to answer any questions after reading a statement.
While dropping the rape charges, prosecutors brought child pornography charges against the two male teens. McCarthy said 18-year-old Henry Sanchez will be charged with possession of child pornography, which carries a potential sentence of up to five years.
He declined to say what charges the 17-year-old would face.
The AP does not typically identify juveniles charged with crimes and is not naming the 17-year-old now that he is charged as a juvenile.
Defense lawyer Maria Mena said the pornography charges stem from the video the 14-year-old girl sent to the 17-yearold, which he then shared with Sanchez. She called it “egregious” that her client was being charged, while the girl who made the video and sent it to him is not being charged.
Another defense attorney, David Wooten, said the primary reason they were able to prove the 17-year-old’s innocence was by producing the evidence of explicit text messages and the video that the girl had sent.
“Those very text messages and images that vindicated him are now being used against him,” he said.
Immigration battle
The 17-year-old came to the U.S. from El Salvador to live with relatives who are U.S. citizens after his adoptive grandmother died in El Salvador, leaving him alone there, his lawyers said. Mena said Friday that immigration proceedings have been initiated against him, but they will fight to keep him in the country.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement said the 18-year-old was stopped by a border patrol agent in Texas last year after arriving from Guatemala and that an immigration detainer has been placed for him.
After the initial charges were filed in March, White House spokesman Sean Spicer, in response to a reporter’s question, called the allegations shocking and disturbing, saying “Part of the reason that the president has made illegal immigration and crackdown such a big deal is because of tragedies like this.”
At Friday’s White House briefing, spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked whether the White House unfairly jumped to conclusions in the case. She said Spicer “was speaking about what he knew at the time.”