SAN JOSE – A judge has denied bail for Omar Torres, the disgraced former city councilman who resigned from office earlier this month amid two sexual misconduct investigations, including one involving allegations of repeated sexual misconduct There was a history of abuse of a minor relative, which led to his arrest and imprisonment last week.
Judge Hector Ramon issued the sentence Thursday in a San Jose courtroom, citing an alleged confession Torres made in a police-monitored phone call between himself and his accuser.
“The court will find, based on clear and convincing evidence, that if Mr. Torres is released, there is a strong likelihood that a boy under the age of 18 will suffer grievous bodily harm,” Ramon said.
Torres was arrested and charged on Nov. 5 and charged the following day with three counts of kid molestation, including sodomy and forcible oral sex and lewd and lascivious acts with a minor under 14 years old.
His resignation, submitted just hours before his arrest, has sparked a political firestorm at City Hall because the mayor and city council battle over tips on how to fill Torres' seat – with the balance of power between the town council's pro-business and labor-oriented forces strained Deployment – when his resignation takes effect on November twenty seventh.
The Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office denied bail, but a motion containing prosecutors' formal arguments was sealed by Ramon on the grounds that its release would jeopardize the continued investigation into Torres, in keeping with court records.
However, after Torres' first court appearance, the office said that prosecutors had taken the position that he posed “a current and ongoing threat to the community” given the various police investigations into his alleged sexual interest in children.
The criminal charges against Torres relate to alleged acts that occurred on Nov. 25, 1999, a couple of month after Torres turned 18. An accompanying report from the San Jose Police Department details allegations that Torres had abused the reported victim several years prior, starting when the victim was 4 years old, but Torres was also a minor.
The reported victim contacted police on November 4 of this yr within the wake of a scandal related to a separate department investigation into other allegations of Torres' sexual interest in minors. That investigation, which didn’t lead to an arrest or charges, became public knowledge on Oct. 3 when Torres was arrested and questioned by San Jose investigators.
According to investigators, on the identical day the allegations were reported, the victim had a police-monitored phone call with Torres during which Torres admitted to abusing the victim and no less than one other minor relative.
“I'm so sorry for hurting you,” Torres is quoted as telling his accuser within the police report. “I'm currently in intensive therapy to work on myself, and I haven't stopped thinking about the harm I've caused you.”
Torres also reportedly said within the phone call that he was a victim of sexual abuse as a toddler and suggested that the alleged assaults were a results of his own trauma.
The police report also indicates that the abuse alleged by Torres had been known in his family for years and that the reported victim got here forward to police after seeing news reports concerning the separate sexual misconduct investigation.
Judge Ramon issued a no-contact order for Torres to steer clear of his accuser, who was referred to in court as John Doe.
A search warrant affidavit from the sooner investigation said Torres asked police to research a Chicago man who allegedly blackmailed him into keeping a sexual rendezvous secret from his partner and colleagues. But the investigation uncovered evidence of Torres' own illegal actions.
That included a 2022 sexually explicit text exchange with the Chicago man during which they shared sexual fantasies during which, amongst other things, Torres described the genitals of an autistic 11-year-old boy with whom he has a familial relationship. He also claimed within the texts that he performed oral sex on a 17-year-old boy while working at an unspecified college.
One of probably the most salacious messages got here when Torres was in the midst of planning a sexual encounter with multiple partners and asked the Chicago man if “you have any buddies under 18.”
Torres told police the person threatened to release nude photos and videos of her sexual messages. Torres said he initially complied with the person's demands and over time paid greater than $22,000.
After news of the interrogation broke in October, Torres defended himself by claiming that the Chicago man had facilitated the blackmail by pressuring him to debate “harmful” topics “under the guise of eroticism.” Torres also claimed that the lyrics “did not reflect any real actions or intentions and were entirely fictional.”
image credit : www.mercurynews.com