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DNA links suspect to assaults/ Accused rapist tied to 2 other
Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Feb 4, 2001 by Anslee Willett
New DNA test results have provided evidence to charge an accused rapist with two more sexual assaults, a prosecutor with the 4th Judicial District Attorney's Office said Saturday.
Anthony Allen Peralez, 40, has been charged in the 1999 assault of a Security woman. He also is being held on suspicion of breaking into a 72-year-old woman's Knob Hill home Nov. 18. The homeowner shot and wounded Peralez in self defense.
Peralez is being held without bond at the El Paso County Criminal Justice Center.
The new charges, to be filed Monday, stem from sexual assaults on Aug. 6 and Sept. 2 in Colorado Springs, said prosecutor Christian Schwaner.
"As a result of DNA tests, that's why we're filing the other charges," he said.
Multiple counts will be filed in each of the two cases, he said, and a preliminary hearing date will be set for all four cases.
"Given the nature of the cases and the number of cases, the public defender may request separate days because this will be time consuming," Schwaner said.
About two weeks ago, an additional 18 counts were filed against Peralez related to the kidnapping, rape and burglary in a Sept. 12, 1999, assault of a 51-year-old Security woman on Rosemont Drive.
Grandmother faces 10 years for 'unforgivable' abuse
Colorado Springs 7/13/02
They called it the family secret. A 6-year-old boy's mother and grandmother teamed up to create a childhood hell, prosecutors say - burning him with lighters, starving him and forcing him to sleep in a dog cage, walk on a leash, wear diapers and survive for days duct-taped to a kitchen table.
The boy's 8-year-old sister told investigators she witnessed the abuse and their mother often forced her to kick him in the groin. And the children's mother told the 8-year-old she, too, would suffer if she revealed "the family secret," according to court files in the 4th Judicial District.
The boy's 28-year-old mother, Tonya, dished out and directed the abuse, and the boy's 47-year-old grandmother, Faith, followed her orders, prosecutors say. The Gazette is withholding the family's last name to protect the identity of the children.
Monday, Faith will be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison for her role in what Deputy District Attorney Christian Schwaner called the most horrifying child-abuse case he's seen. Faith pleaded guilty in May to two counts of felony child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury. Tonya is headed to trial Sept. 10 on six counts of the same charge and one count of conspiracy to commit child abuse.
Prosecutors allege the abuse occurred between December 2001 and Feb. 20. "It's just the most awful thing imaginable," Schwaner said. "Everything that was done to that child is unforgivable." The family secret started to unravel Feb. 20, the day Tonya took the boy to the Colorado State Hospital in Pueblo for a mental health evaluation and claimed he was mutilating himself. Doctors noticed he was malnourished and covered with open sores, burns and scars. When questioned, Tonya told hospital personnel the boy caught his pajamas on fire while playing with matches, according to an affidavit used to support Tonya and Faith's arrests. The case was turned over to El Paso County since the mother and grandmother live there.
The boy had more than 40 injuries in different stages of healing that were apparently inflicted at different times, according to the affidavit El Paso County sheriff's detective Teresa Murphy filed. They included a quarter-inch patch of hair and skin missing from the back of his head, chaffing and scratches around his neck, and scratches and burns on his back, hands, legs, feet, testicles and groin. Doctors told Murphy they didn't believe the wounds were self-inflicted or caused by the boy's pajamas catching fire. Murphy confronted Tonya and Faith. Initially, Faith told detectives the boy secretly stole from her, urinated on her belongings, and "has no respect for the love of Jesus," Murphy's affidavit says. Faith said she believes he "has the devil in him" because he once told her in a deep, raspy voice that he was "Lucifer."
Faith insisted she had never disciplined him other than spanking him and forcing him to stand against a kitchen door. But Tonya said Faith forced the boy to wear diapers, wear a leash and harness, sleep on the floor, and bound his wrists with duct tape for the two weeks prior to their visit to the Pueblo hospital. When confronted with Tonya's story, Faith admitted she bound the boy for two weeks but denied any physical or sexual abuse, Murphy's affidavit says.
In March, the victim told caseworkers his mother removed him from school, often burned him with a lighter and made him sleep in a dog cage. His mom and grandmother would tape his entire head except for his nostrils and mouth and feed him nothing but oatmeal, then later rip off the tape, taking skin and hair with it, the boy said.
The older sister confirmed the abuse March 15, according to the affidavit. She also said her mother made her fight with her brother "to see who would win" and "play yo-yo" by placing a belt through a buckle around his neck, then pulling on it until he choked. The girl apologized for not telling authorities about the abuse sooner, but she said she feared for her safety. "I didn't want to tell you because my mom told me to keep it a family secret," she said. "I don't think I could survive the things he did."
The boy's wounds are healing and he and his siblings are in foster care, Schwaner said. He said this case is far worse than one that made headlines late last year when a mother and father pleaded guilty to forcing their adopted son to live in a tiny room under the stairs, urinate and defecate in a bucket, masturbate in front of siblings, do calisthenics in the nude, eat meals on the floor and wear a dog shock collar. Prosecutors didn't seek felony convictions in that case because they could not prove the child suffered serious physical injury, Schwaner said. Colorado law provides for felony convictions in cases of physical and sexual abuse of children, but not for psychological abuse. The parents in that case pleaded guilty to misdemeanor child abuse charges. The woman was sentenced to two years in the El Paso County jail, the maximum the law allows. Her ex-husband was sentenced to four years in prison because he pleaded guilty to an unrelated felony theft charge as well as misdemeanor child abuse. Schwaner hinted he'll seek a long prison sentence at Faith's hearing Monday. He hopes the grandmother will testify against her daughter, although that's not spelled out in the plea deal.
Faith, who is awaiting sentencing in the El Paso County jail, could not be reached for comment. But in a six-page letter to Judge Tom Kennedy, Faith asked for mercy. Faith blamed the bulk of the abuse on Tonya, saying her daughter told lies to pit the children and grandmother against each other. Faith said she abused the boy only because Tonya threatened worse punishment - even death - if she didn't follow her orders. "I do admit to these charges your honor but I did them to protect my grandson from worse bodily harm and death, which Tonya threatened quite often," Faith wrote. "I found myself hooked in my daughter's web and was in fear all the time."
Faith's pastor also wrote a letter on her behalf, calling her a strong believer in prayer, a vacation Bible school volunteer and a regular worshipper who often brought her grandchildren to church. Tonya, who is free on $25,000 bond, blamed Faith for the abuse. Tonya said Faith abused her and tried to abandon her when she was a child.
"She'd burn me with cigarettes," Tonya said. "She put me in the state hospital, claiming I was Satan. I had to stay in the state hospital for a year because she didn't want me back. It was basically the same sort of thing that happened to my son." Tonya pointed out she's the one who took her son to the hospital. She's bitter that social services caseworkers have placed her children in foster care and are trying to terminate her parental rights. In April, she had a baby boy who has been placed in the same foster home as his brothers and sister.
Tonya said she hasn't been allowed to visit her children in weeks, and she's convinced her children are being coached to testify against her. "I miss my kids very badly," she said, "I just want to see them."
July 16, 2002
Grandmother gets 10 years for abuse
By Bill Hethcock
The Gazette (Colorado Springs)
A woman who pleaded guilty to severely abusing her 6-year-old grandson was sentenced to 10 years in prison Monday for acts a judge described as "torture."
Prosecutors said the 47-year-old woman, Faith, teamed with her daughter to burn, beat and starve the boy for three months. The Gazette is withholding the family's last name to protect the child's identity.
Judge Tom Kennedy of the 4th Judicial District said he would have sentenced the woman to more time if the punishment had not been capped by a plea bargain. Kennedy said it's the worst child abuse he's seen in 20 years as a judge, prosecutor and defense attorney.
"What you did to that child was torture, that's the only word for it," Kennedy said. "Torture for the sole purpose of inflicting pain on another human being.
"You call upon me to give you mercy. Did you show mercy for this young boy as he screamed in pain while you tortured him?"
Faith pleaded guilty in May to two counts of felony child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury. Her daughter, Tonya, 28, is scheduled for trial Sept. 10 on six counts of the same charge and one count of conspiracy to commit child abuse. Prosecutors allege the abuse occurred from December to Feb. 20.
El Paso County sheriff's detective Teresa Murphy said there is no penalty harsh enough for happened to the boy.
"It's a miracle this child is alive," she said.
Prosecutor Christian Schwaner showed photos of the boy's burns, wounds and scars to the judge.
Schwaner said Faith and Tonya taped red-hot quarters all over the child's body, burned him with a barbecue lighter and scalded him with steam. The women would pick at his wounds when they began to heal.
They would choke the boy until he passed out, force his 8-year-old sister to kick and punch him in the genitals and use duct-tape to cover the boy's head or bind him for days to a kitchen table, Schwaner said. The women told the boy he was Lucifer, forced him to sleep taped and gagged in a dog kennel, and rarely fed him, the prosecutor said.
Faith appeared in court handcuffed and wearing a blue El Paso County jail uniform. She showed little emotion, even when proclaiming her love for the grandchild she pleaded guilty to abusing.
"Whatever you give me today is everything I deserve," she told Kennedy.
"I'm sorry for what I've done, and I love my grandchildren."
Her public defender, Cynthia Jones, asked Kennedy for a probationary sentence. Jones said Faith has learned her lesson during 114 days in jail and realizes she won't see her grandchildren again. Faith did not inflict the bulk of the abuse, Jones said.
Faith is an uneducated woman who didn't know how to show affection, Jones said.
"The love that she felt for the children was not expressed in the correct way," she said.
Tonya, who was in court, said she was out of state on a 21/2-month trip with her husband, a trucker, during the time the abuse was alleged.
Tonya, who is free on bond, attempted to speak to her mother in court, but Faith told her to go home and moved to the opposite side of the courtroom. Sheriff's deputies warned Tonya she would be kicked out if she continued to try to speak to her mother.
Copyright 2002, The Gazette, a Freedom Communications, Inc. Company.
Colorado Springs Gazette Aug 16, 2001
Woman recounts break-in
72-year-old testifies she shot suspect in three rapes
By Bill Hethcock/The Gazette
Jean Zamarripa had just said her bedtime prayers when she heard a strange noise toward the back of her house.
At first, the 72-year-old grandmother thought it was her humidifier, but she quickly figured out it was someone trying to break into the back door of her Knob Hill home.
Minutes later, she shot Anthony Allen Peralez and ended a string of rapes targeting women in their 50s, 60s and 70s, prosecutors said Wednesday on the first day of Peralez's trial.
Zamarripa told jurors she grabbed her loaded revolver from under her bed and braced her elbow on the counter to steady her trembling hand.
Barefoot and in her nightgown, she waited with the gun aimed where she thought the intruder would enter.
Outside, she heard him prop open her storm door.
Then he ran up to and broke through the locked door, ripping the deadbolt holder out of the doorjamb.
The intruder's momentum knocked him to the ground, but Zamarripa never adjusted her aim. When he stood up, Zamarripa wounded him with three out of four shots from about eight feet away before he scrambled out the door.
"I knew if I didn't shoot him, he would have raped me," she said.
Zamarripa said she knew of a 56-year-old woman and a 74-year-old woman in her neighborhood who had been raped shortly before the Nov. 18 break-in at her home.
She seemed calm as she testified. But she told jurors she was full of fear that night.
"In 72 years, I had never lived through anything like it," she said. "The only way I can describe it is sheer terror."
Prosecutors have charged Peralez, 41, with burglarizing, raping and beating a 56-year-old woman Sept. 2 on North Sheridan Avenue and a 74-year-old woman Aug. 6, 2000, on Eagle View Drive.
He also is charged with burglarizing, kidnapping and raping a 51-year-old Security woman Sept. 12, 1999.
In all three cases, the women lived alone, and in each case the women were forced to bathe or were cleaned after being sexually assaulted.
Those similarities, along with the women's ages and others, should convince jurors that the man who committed the three rapes is the same man who broke into Zamarripa's house, prosecutor Christian Schwaner said.
DNA evidence also connects the crimes, he said.
"This is literally every woman's worst nightmare -- to be home at night and have somebody brutally rape you," Schwaner said.
Public defender Eydie Elkins said Peralez made his only mistakes the night he allegedly broke into Zamarripa's house.
"His is the nightmare of false accusations," she said.
Elkins said the defense will show the prosecution's DNA evidence is not reliable.
She said differences in the rapes suggest different suspects did them.
One woman was raped at gunpoint, one at knifepoint and in one case the rapist used no weapon. One lasted more than six hours; another lasted less than one hour, Elkins said.
"Each one was different, unique," she said. "When you listen to the evidence, it is clear that they were conducted by different men, none of them Tony Peralez."
The victim of the six-hour rape said her attacker had chest hair but not a tattoo, Elkins said. Peralez has "an unmistakable tattoo" on his torso, Elkins said.
Police who investigated the break-in and shooting at Zamarripa's home testified that a trail of blood led them from Zamarripa's driveway north to San Miguel Street, where Peralez got in his car and drove away.
Two blocks away, the wounded Peralez hit another car and kept going, police testified.
From the site of the first crash on San Miguel, police followed a trail of leaking oil, antifreeze and car parts past a second hit-and-run crash he caused on Holmes Drive and eventually to the parking lot of a car dealership near Galley and Academy Boulevard.
That's where Peralez gave up, police testified. He had been shot once in the abdomen and twice in the arm.
Blood samples taken from Zamarripa's driveway and Peralez's car and clothes provided the genetic profile that linked him to the three rapes, Schwaner said.
Zamarripa was cleared of any wrongdoing under a state law reaffirming the right to defend one's home.
