A former Marine threatened to have witnesses and victims harmed to keep them from testifying in his upcoming trial on rape, abduction and robbery charges, prosecutors said in court Thursday.
Jorge “George” Torrez is accused of robbing and trying to abduct one woman and kidnapping and raping another in separate incidents in February, when he was stationed at Henderson Hall. He has also been linked through DNA to the killings of two young girls near Chicago, but has not been charged in that case.
Arlington County Circuit Court Judge Benjamin Kendrick ruled that prosecutors can use Torrez’s statements about intimidating witnesses, which were made to jailhouse informants.
Torrez said what he wanted done and how he would offer payment, Detective Darien Cupka of the Arlington County police testified.
Those statements were made under illegal interrogation by an informant — outfitted with a recording device — who used “psychological ploys to get Mr. Torrez to talk,” defense attorney Jason Rucker argued.
When the threats came to light this summer, “law enforcement did what they had a duty to do,” Kendrick said.
Commonwealth’s Attorney Richard Trodden said prosecutors don’t intend to introduce the statements in their case, and will only use them to rebut any claims Torrez makes about his innocence.
Kendrick also ruled that prosecutors can present as evidence a stun gun found in Torrez’s vehicle, even though authorities don’t allege that the device was used in the assaults.
Torrez’s trial is scheduled to begin Tuesday.
He allegedly tried to force a woman into his car at gunpoint and took her purse when she resisted. He is also accused of restraining two women in a house and raping one of them in his vehicle.
Torrez is linked to the 2005 slayings of 8-year-old Laura Hobbs and 9-year-old Krystal Tobias in Zion, Ill., where he used to live. Murder charges were dropped against Laura’s father, who had spent five years in jail awaiting trial, after DNA evidence pointed to a new suspect.
No one from Illinois attended Arlington authorities’ meetings with the inmate informants, Cupka testified.
Torrez served in the Marines from September 2006 to April 2010, when he was discharged for misconduct.
