Sandra Garcia, on the left, and Mark Anthony Roque, on the right, in booking photos. (Fresno County Sheriff’s Office)
A California woman on trial for a 2016 kidnapping conspiracy meant to indirectly hurt her ex-boyfriend — by targeting his then-13-year-old daughter — took the stand and professed her innocence on Tuesday.
Sandra Garcia, 48, and her son, Mark Anthony Roque, 25, face numerous felonies over the teen girl’s kidnapping in February 2016 including conspiracy to commit a crime, sexual penetration by force, kidnapping, torture and dissuading a witness by force. Their trial began in late September in Fresno County. Two other men – including another one of Garcia’s sons – have also been charged.
Prosecutors say Garcia put the kidnapping scheme into motion after her ex-boyfriend, Johan Gidstedt, kicked her out of his home in Clovis. The alleged plan was to scare Gidstedt’s daughters, then ages 10 and 13, so much that they would beg to move back in with their mother in their native Sweden. At that point, the defendant allegedly figured she would be back in Gidstedt’s good graces.
“I was angry and felt betrayed and upset with the girls,” Garcia testified in Fresno County court on Tuesday, according to a courtroom report by The Fresno Bee. “There were things being said about me that were not true. But I was just venting.”
That purported “venting” took place on telephone calls between Garcia and her cousin Miguel Carriedo, who was also accused of participating in the plot. Carriedo had secretly recorded conversations between himself and Garcia discussing getting revenge on Gidstedt and his daughters. Prosecutors identified Garcia as the female voice telling the man on the other end that she wanted to “scare the hell out of the girls,” according to the Bee. The woman suggests kidnapping the children from their home, taking them to a remote place, and even removing their clothes to maximize the terror – all so the victims would want to move back to Sweden.
According to the Bee, Garcia said she tried to stop the plot, but Carriedo carried it out anyway.
The victim took the stand last month. In testimony, she described her assailants and the initial incident that occurred on Feb. 16, 2016. Just minutes after she got off the school bus, black-clad men came to her door, taped her eyes shut, and threw her into the trunk of a car.
Earlier this month, the victim returned to the stand and described the ensuing attack and humiliation in horrifying detail.
The now 20-something woman told Fresno County jurors that after being kidnapped, she was stripped naked, beaten, sexually assaulted with a stick, and then left tied to a tree for hours in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains outside of Clovis. She eventually tore herself free from the yellow rope binding her and then managed to walk for over a mile until she found a homeowner who called the local sheriff.
“During the investigation, detectives discovered this crime was not a random act,” the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office said in a press release. “Garcia, who was the girlfriend of the victim’s father, had conspired with the other men to kidnap the teen.”
Carriedo, 47, is one of two of Garcia’s alleged conspirators who have already accepted legal culpability for what happened. He is now a state’s witness after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit a crime and torture. In exchange for his testimony and evidence, Carriedo faces a sentence of 15 years to life in prison.
Garcia’s other son, Brandon Roque, 26, has pleaded no contest to conspiracy to commit a crime.
This month, Carriedo testified that he agreed to help his cousin with such a plan because she promised to introduce him to a paralegal who could, in turn, help him with a child custody dispute involving his sons, the paper reported. But the connection never happened, Garcia’s cousin testified.
Garcia’s defense attorney, Woodrow Nichols, sought to contextualize his client’s claimed venting.
“She had no place to go, she had sold her car and she couldn’t move back to her mother’s house because there were too many people living there,” Nichols told the court, according to the Bee.
The defense also said the accused kidnapping mastermind was raised in a broken home – and when she was 11 or 12 years old, a trusted adult sexually abused her.
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