Quick-thinking woman and DNA solve cold case sexual assault, NM officials say

Miami Herald

2 days ago

A man accused of sexually assaulting a woman more than a decade ago has been convicted, New Mexico prosecutors said.
Omar Navarro-Flores was convicted in the 2014 cold case sexual assault of a woman, the Bernalillo County District Attorney's Office said in a May 30 Facebook post.
Navarro-Flores pleaded not guilty at his June 2019 arraignment, court documents show.
In a June 2 email to McClatchy News, Assistant Public Defender Graham Dumas, Navarro-Flores' attorney, noted that his client's conviction came during a retrial 'after he was acquitted in November of a number of very serious offenses.'
'The Defense stand by our argument that he was denied a fair trial by the incredibly poor police investigation into the case. The police, who allowed this case to lie dormant for five years, did not even try to locate critical witnesses or surveillance footage from the street corner where Mr. Navarro-Flores first allegedly encountered (the woman),' Dumas said. 'By the time this case was indicted in 2019, no amount of defense investigation could address that issue.'
As a woman was walking to a bus stop May 6, 2014, a man grabbed her and 'threw her in his car,' prosecutors said.
The man drove around Albuquerque with the woman, threatening 'she would never see her children again,' prosecutors said.
He sexually assaulted and physically attacked her, 'hitting her head against the steering wheel, and slapping her,' according to prosecutors.
During the alleged attack, the woman managed to write down the man's license plate number on her wrist, prosecutors said.
After being dropped off at the State Fairgrounds area, the woman contacted security, who 'called police and an ambulance,' prosecutors said.
The woman gave police the license plate number from her wrist, prosecutors said.
Days later, officers pulled Navarro-Flores over, then 'his car was towed and searched,' prosecutors said.
DNA ultimately linked Navarro-Flores to the alleged sexual assault, according to prosecutors.
He was arrested in June 2019, court records show.
On May 30, a jury found Navarro-Flores guilty of criminal sexual contact and false imprisonment, prosecutors said.
'We will continue to fight for Mr. Navarro-Flores at sentencing, and on appeal if he so chooses,' Dumas said.
Navarro-Flores' conviction comes after the city of Albuquerque established a project to test a backlog of rape kits per the direction of Mayor Tim Keller's 2018 executive order, the city says on its website.
'The implementation of The Sexual Assault Evidence Kit Backlog Reduction Project is the first step to correcting oversights and changing the course of action for the future,' the website says.
Between 2017 and 2020, more than 4,500 backlogged sexual assault evidence kits were tested, data on the city's website shows.
'As part of a coordinated effort to address Albuquerque's backlog of untested, Sexual Assault Kit cases,' the Sexual Assault Kit Initiative was also formed, according to the district attorney's website.
'The SAKI Team, a dedicated group of attorneys, investigators and victim advocates, is tasked with reviewing, testing and prosecuting rape kit backlog cases and working with victims to build cases and provide them with supportive services and resources,' the website says.
The district attorney's office SAKI unit, which has had 24 cold case rape convictions in two years, prosecuted Navarro-Flores' case, prosecutors said.