CENTREVILLE — St. Joseph County District Court Judge David Pattison bound over Miguel Hernandez-Ruiz, 24, to circuit court Wednesday to stand trial for the March 20 rape of two grade school sisters in their home.
Three weeks after the first half day of preliminary examination testimony, St. Joseph County prosecutor David Marvin presented the final pieces of evidence needed to convince the judge there was enough evidence, without an actual in-court identification, that Hernandez-Ruiz should stand trial.
Both the 6-year-old and the 8-year-old took the stand to try to tell what happened in the early morning hours of March 20 when a man came into their mother's bedroom where they slept.
Neither could pick out Hernandez-Ruiz in court as the attacker.
Defense attorney Ross Truckey objected to the bind-over due to the lack of identification of his client as the attacker.
Pattison said, "Identity is really the issue here that gives me the most difficulty and was absolutely critical."
The judge felt the evidence showed Hernandez-Ruiz was the attacker due to "this confluence of coincidences or circumstantial evidence." That included:
- The girls' mother worked at the same Indiana factory as Hernandez-Ruiz.
- Hernandez-Ruiz saw the mother with the little girls at a Sturgis store in the weeks before the attack.
- Hernandez-Ruiz reached out to the mother at work and asked her for help with his insurance, getting her phone number and coming to their home in the Sweetwater trailer park east of Sturgis on U.S. 12.
- Sturgis Police recorded the Jeep used by Hernandez on a Flock license plate reader headed east on U.S. 12 that morning at 2:49 a.m., seven miles from the trailer park east of Sturgis.
- A neighbor's security video showed only a red Jeep driving down the entrance street into Sweet Lake Park toward the victim's home at 2:56 a.m.
- A Michigan State Police Cyber Crime expert used cellphone data to show Hernandez-Ruiz's phone traveled from his home east to the area of the trailer park between 2:45 a.m. and 2:56 a.m. when the signal stopped for 21 minutes. The phone signal returned at 3:17 a.m. and drove back to Hernandez-Ruiz's home address area at 3:25 a.m.
- On March 22, Hernandez-Ruiz told his ex-girlfriend, who purchased the Jeep for him, that he planned to move to Ft. Wayne to join his brother.
- After Hernandez-Ruiz learned that St. Joseph County Sheriff Sgt. Paulino Hernandez was looking for him, he changed his long-time cell number.
The mother testified through an interpreter when she returned home that morning, she looked up on Facebook the three or possibly four men who had come to their home. She showed the daughters the Facebook pictures. She said only the youngest saw his face and identified Hernandez-Ruiz as the attacker.
However Pattison could not consider the testimony because it was hearsay.
Sgt. Hernandez collected DNA at the crime scene.
Marvin said the Michigan State Police testing lab has yet to complete the analysis, but he hoped the test would be ready in the next six weeks to confirm the attacker's identity.
Plea bargain?
Forced to trial, Marvin said he might need to consider a plea bargain. "Nobody wants to see a plea deal. But there are the consequences, putting the 6-year-old and an 8-year-old on the stand again."
During the closed preliminary exam on June 5, "one of them was braver than the other. One couldn't even speak. She froze. So, I have to weigh that. Is it worth it?" Marvin asked.
Marvin was concerned about presenting enough evidence at the preliminary exam. If Hernandez-Ruiz was released, "as an undocumented, he would flee. We'd never see him again."
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Hernandez-Ruiz faces one count of home invasion first degree and two counts of criminal sexual conduct first degree with the victim under the age of 13. The CSC charges are life felonies.
— Contact Don Reid: dReid@Gannett.com
This article originally appeared on Coldwater Daily Reporter: Man accused of sexually assaulting two girls bound to circuit court
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