Judge orders psychiatric evaulation for 81-year-old charged with molestation
January 28th, 2009 by TCPalm.comFORT PIERCE — An 81-year-old man who had accepted a plea deal on child molestation charges claimed his innocence Tuesday just as he was to be sentenced, prompting Circuit Judge Cynthia Cox to order a psychiatric evaluation.
The sentencing hearing for Aureliano Garcia-Campo of Port St. Lucie had gone on nearly three hours when Cox gave him a chance to speak. Garcia-Campo said through an interpreter, “The only thing I have to say is that I am innocent.”
Authorities charged that Garcia-Campo, while a volunteer at a Head Start day-care center on Lennard Road in fall 2007, inappropriately touched several 4- and 5-year-old girls. One girl told police he not only touched her genitals and buttocks but also fondled her.
Port St. Lucie Detective Lisa Carrasquillo testified Garcia-Campo admitted touching the girls and demonstrated what he had done using an anatomically correct doll.
Using a laptop computer on the judge’s bench, Cox privately watched a three-minute DVD of that part of Carrasquillo’s interview with Garcia-Campo.
Originally charged with two counts of sexual battery on a child under 12 and five counts of lewd and lascivious molestation of a child under 12, Garcia-Campo faced up to life in prison. Under the agreed-upon plea deal, the more serious sexual battery charges would have been dropped and the State Attorney’s Officer would have asked for no more than 20 years in prison.
Victims’ parents said they agreed to the deal to keep their children from having to testify at a trial and because a 20-year sentence would keep the 81-year-old in prison the rest of his life.
Cox tentatively rescheduled the sentencing for 11 a.m. March 31.
A letter from Garcia-Campo’s children and grandchildren read during the hearing called him “a great man, an honorable man” and said his “moral values were the pillar of our upbringing.”
Several of the girls’ parents said the molestations have had long-lasting effects on their children.
“I’m asking for justice for my little girl,” one father said. “She will carry this scar for the rest of her life.”
After the hearing, the same father said he was frustrated that Garcia-Campo wasn’t sentenced and the victims and their families didn’t get closure.
“This man destroyed my daughter,” the father said, “and he needs to be taken care of as soon as possible.”
– Tyler Treadway
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