Woman Testifies Against Alleged Kidnapper

A woman who was allegedly kidnapped by her mother’s boyfriend and forced to marry and have a child with her abductor testified Wednesday in the trial against him.

The woman avoided eye contact with her alleged kidnapper as she took the stand and told the jury that the abuse started within months of arriving from Mexico with her sisters.

Isidro Medrano Garcia, 42, of Bell Gardens, faced one felony count of forcible rape, three felony counts of lewd acts on a minor and one felony count of kidnapping to commit a sexual offense, according to the Orange County District Attorney's office.

The woman, now 26, testified Garcia began sexually abusing her when she was just 15. She said he told her they would both be in trouble if she told her mother and that he would call immigration authorities.

“He called me to come to my moms bedroom. He locked the bathroom and bedroom door and that's when he started to take my clothes off. He just asked me not to yell. I knew something bad was going to happen,” she said from the witness stand of an Orange County courtroom.

The woman said her sisters and a baby sitter were in another room at their Santa Ana apartment.

She said Garcia started treating her differently after the abuse began by buying her clothes and a computer. She testified she never found Garcia him attractive.

Prosecutors say Garcia kidnapped the teenager and changed both of their names using fake documents. They said he told the girl she could not leave him because she would be deported.

The couple lived in a Bell Gardens apartment where they married and had a child, a daughter who is now three. Neighbors said they never suspected there was anything wrong.

A missing-person report was filed in 2004 — the year of the alleged kidnapping, according to prosecutors.

He allegedly forced the woman into marriage in 2007 and had a child with her in 2012.

Defense attorneys, however, say the woman went willingly with Garcia, married him and had a child with him.