Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Jury ponders Alcon verdict
BENTONVILLE — A jury deliberated for almost four hours Wednesday but didn’t reach a verdict in the case of a former state employee charged with sexually assaulting a 4-year-old girl.
Jorge Alcon, 71, of Bentonville faces a sentence of five to 20 years in prison if convicted.
The jury began deliberating shortly after lunch. Circuit Judge Brad Karren sent the panel home at 5 p.m. and told them to return this morning.
Alcon worked for the state Department of Human Services as a program assistant and provided transportation and supervision for visitations. The girl was in foster care.
The 6-year-old testified Wednesday morning. She couldn’t identify Alcon, who sat across the courtroom at a table with
his attorneys, but said Alcon took her to visit her birth mother and sister.
“What part of his body did he show you,” Carrie Dobbs, deputy prosecutor, asked.
“His pee-pee,” the girl responded.
She said she was in the restroom and Alcon asked her to touch him.
Valerie Goudie, one of Alcon’s attorneys, questioned the child about her memory. The girl said she ‘kinda’ remembered what happened in the bathroom.
“Sweetie do you remember what happened or do you remember because someone told you it happened?” Goudie asked.
“A little bit of both,” the girl responded.
Jurors spent hours listening to police interviews of Alcon where he described the 4-year-old as the sexual aggressor and said he never touched the girl in a sexual manner.
Dobbs told jurors the girl was 4 years old at the time and Alcon was a grown man. “There was one aggressor in the bathroom and it’s not her,” she said.
Jay Martin, Alcon’s other attorney, told jurors the girl had been coached.
“We believe this is a troubled child,” Martin said. “We don’t believe a 4-year-old is some sexual aggressor and she was trying to hurt Mr. Alcon.”
Martin told jurors he believed the girl was wronged by someone, but not his client.
“We’re standing with Mr. Alcon today because he’s innocent and we ask you to find him not guilty of the charge,” Martin said.
Dobbs said the girl wasn’t coached to lie and Alcon is the only person with a motive to lie. She told jurors Alcon preyed on and sexually assaulted the girl and Dobbs asked jurors to find Alcon guilty of the crime.