I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy"
Posted on 09/06/2014 12:45:41 AM PDT by csvset
NORFOLK
Her attacker broke in through a back door while she was sleeping. He tied her up and held a knife to her throat. He said he wasn't going to rape her, that he was hungry and just wanted money.
But he did rape her. A month later, he returned in the middle of the night to the same house near Ocean View. He bound the woman and her teenage daughter with duct tape and raped the girl.
Norfolk police investigated, but the case went cold.
Two years later in Kuwait, in 2010, an Army captain was showering when a man whose face was covered by a shirt snuck up behind her holding a box cutter. She tried to fight him, but he began cutting and punching her. He turned her around, then suddenly ran away.
Through DNA testing, authorities discovered that the genetic profile matched in Norfolk and in Kuwait. But the attacker's DNA did not match anyone in the FBI's database.
About a year ago, Norfolk police discovered a match between a fingerprint found on a condom package at one of the 2008 attacks and a Norfolk man, Amin Jason Carl Garcia, according to court records.
Garcia was a Navy reservist who had lived in the Ocean View area in 2008 and who served in Kuwait in 2010.
On Jan. 2 of this year, a Norfolk Circuit Court grand jury indicted Garcia in the Norfolk attacks. Authorities found him in Brooklyn, N.Y., seven days later. Last month, the U.S. Attorney's Office filed a federal charge of attempted rape against Garcia in the Kuwait attack.
Police were surprised when they learned that Garcia was their suspect. He was a track star at Norview High School who won numerous local and state meets. The Virginian-Pilot named him a top-10 track athlete in 2006.
A hamstring injury ended his career and cost him a scholarship. He joined the Navy right out of school, serving in India, Kuwait and Afghanistan. As a petty officer second class, he worked as a utilitiesman maintaining plumbing, heating and air conditioning systems. He had a clean record, collecting 10 awards and decorations.
During an interrogation in January, a Norfolk detective told Garcia he'd done a lot of positive things:
"Your character is not bad. This doesn't sound like the kind of thing you would do. Going back to your character, you're not a guy who's on the street. You're not on the street gangbanging, shooting and robbing.... You're a good, hardworking guy."
Detectives and agents with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service were careful in their pursuit of Garcia after finding the fingerprint match. They found him serving in a Navy Reserve unit in the Bronx.
On the weekend of Dec. 14, "NCIS investigators shadowed Garcia," Special Agent Samantha Martin wrote in a court affidavit.
They watched him eat a meal at the base galley. He walked away leaving behind two cups, a fork and a half-eaten banana. The agents seized the items and sent them to a lab in Norfolk for DNA testing. Court records say Garcia's DNA matched samples taken from the crime scenes in Kuwait and in the first rape in Norfolk. The records aren't clear as to whether there was a DNA match in the second Norfolk rape, but police had Garcia's fingerprint from that crime scene, lifted off a package of condoms left behind.
In 2008, Garcia was living about a mile from the rape victims' home. They suspect he spotted the woman and plotted an attack, court records say. At the time, the victim was a 38-year-old chief petty officer.
She described the attack to a detective while in a hospital emergency room during the early morning of Aug. 28, 2008.
He first tried to shove a pillow case in her mouth, then held a knife to her throat.
"He kept saying that all he wanted was money and he wasn't going to hurt me," she told the detective. "He put me on my stomach and tied my hands behind my back."
After he raped her, he started asking her all kinds of questions. He noticed her Navy uniforms hanging up and, inexplicably, called her a baby killer.
"He said he liked me and asked if he could come by and visit," she said in her statement. Then he tied her legs with the cord of an iron. She felt the water from the steamer drip on her body. He stole $200 and left. She managed to untie herself and call 911.
He returned the night of Sept. 23, 2008, while the woman and her teenage daughter were sleeping, according to court records. He bound both with tape and raped the teenager, the records say. (She was not home during the first attack.)
During his interrogation in New York in January, Garcia told a detective that the sex was consensual that August night, but he stopped the interview and asked for a lawyer. Later, while awaiting trial, he filed papers in court saying he had an alibi the night of the second attack. He was with two friends, each of whom backed him on it.
Garcia's case went to trial last week in Norfolk Circuit Court. He did not ask for a jury. A judge convicted him of all six counts: burglary, rape and robbery in the August attack and robbery, burglary and abduction with intent to defile in the September attack.
On Aug. 21, the U.S. Attorney's Office filed a complaint in federal court charging Garcia with attempted aggravated sexual abuse in the Kuwait attack.
At the scene of the April 29, 2010, crime in Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, authorities recovered the tan shirt that the attacker wore over his head. It was covered in blood. Garcia's DNA was found in some of the samples, court records say.
Garcia, 25, remains in jail and will be sentenced for the Norfolk convictions Dec. 12. He does not yet have a date to be in federal court.
His attorney, James Garrett of Virginia Beach, did not respond to phone messages.
Tim McGlone, 757-446-2343, tim.mcglone@pilotonline.com Posted to: Crime News Norfolk
I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy"
Is he sensitive about his ears?
Very well written article. Concise and understandable.
Wow. So the mother, a petty officer, stayed living with her teenage daughter in the same house after she was raped there once. So the guy comes back and does it again and the mother hasn’t increased her security or aquired any weapons for their defense?!? Not blaming the victim here, but holy cow...
Article doesn’t mention it, of course, but Amin is a Muslim name. The “babykiller” comment to the Navy victim is not “inexplicable” at all.
-——Very well written article. Concise and understandable.-——
Yes. Indeed....
Herder and harder to find nowadays....
Looks like he did not plead guilty here and the judge threw the book at him. Good character - Hardly.
Yes, for a change!
But I’m still surprise he was able to elude capture while on a base in Kuwait.
Yes, I thought that too. I don’t think I could keep living there.
Many years ago, when living in a bigger city, outskirts anyway, my house was broken into while I was at work. I came home to it about 1 am.
The next morning, I had an alarm installed, bought 2 dogs.
I had the exact same thought, how did he come back in.
He's got Obama ears - they look like someone left the doors open on the garbage truck.
So he wasnt shot by a white cop? non story
Amin Jason Carl Garcia
I don't care that he's (perhaps) a black Muslim Hispanic; none of those details are crimes. What matters is that he's a violent serial rapist. The felonies should be enough to lock him up for 80+ years without parole. It's not about punishment or rehabilitation in my mind; it's about warehousing him forever, so that he is no longer a danger to decent people.
If you’re active duty military, it’s not that easy to shift housing around. For anyone, selling a house or getting out of a lease and moving is not a fast process. Buying a trained guard dog is not a fast process either. Buying a gun in Virginia—that’s fast.
Ever watch First 48 ? Interrogations are nothing like TV drama interrogations. Rarely confrontations.
The detectives usually sympathize with the perp, befriending him, convincing him he just lost it in the heat of the moment. Even holding the perp's hand sometimes.
It's amazing how some of the most hardened criminals break down and fall for it.
You're watching this and saying to yourself,'is that cop nuts? This guy needs the needle!' but he got the confession.
Danny Reagan tactics aren't productive.(Blue Bloods reference)
Math isn’t your strong suit? You can’t add 1+1 and get 2?
Or is it that you don’t want to risk being politically incorrect?
This is a rare glimpse into the mind of a serial rapist. This guy did not think
for one moment that he would either be caught, or that he was doing anything wrong
Sure he took precautions to avoid arrest but that is considered part of the game
Death sentence due to undeniable proof, he admitted it and DNA proves it.
There is no cure.
I know people who know people up fairly high in law enforcement and its being noted amongst that class of professionals that the next thing is basically pre-crime indicators or profiling in other words. Doesn’t necessarily come down to racial patterns but it will include patterns of life. So if you have it in your head that whites are devils (sub humans) infidels can be abused and your music tastes show a lack of human empathy (gangster rap) you will be known.
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