Testimony in the child molestation trial involving an Aromas man
accused of being a cult leader posing as a growth counselor began
Tuesday, with the 14-year-old accuser saying she was forced to
touch him inappropriately in order to learn about her
sexuality.
Hollister – Testimony in the child molestation trial involving an Aromas man accused of being a cult leader posing as a growth counselor began Tuesday, with the 14-year-old accuser saying she was forced to touch him inappropriately in order to learn about her sexuality.
The victim (who the Free Lance is not naming because she is a minor) testified that Richarde Monde ordered her to touch his penis when she was 7 or 8 years old. Her mother, Jessica Holt, also testified Tuesday that Monde bragged about the incident to several other women living in a communal home in the hills above Aromas. In addition, she said he forced them to have sex with him and each other while performing in a band called South Street in their personal studio, The Final Cut.
But defense attorney Arthur Cantu argued that the incident has been concocted by several of the women living in the house as a way to get the rights to the $750,000 property in the hills above Aromas and custody of a child Monde had with one of the women. Cantu focused on the victim’s uncertain recollection of when the alleged molestation occurred and raised questions about why charges weren’t filed until several years after the act.
In his opening statements and line of questioning, Deputy District Attorney Denny Wei focused largely on Monde’s bizarre living situation with at least seven women over the past couple decades, his alleged proclivity for forcible sex and his alleged past history of sexual indiscretions. Wei promised the jury that a woman would testify that Monde forced her to perform oral copulation on him while they were living in Hawaii in 1986, although charges were never filed by the Hawaii District Attorney’s Office.
After making their opening statements, Wei and Cantu questioned the victim and Holt about the incident that the teen said occurred when she was 7, but Holt said occurred when her daughter was 9 or 10 years old.
“He asked me to touch him,” the victim said. “I was scared so I didn’t do it, but he grabbed my hand and he put it there.”
During Cantu’s questioning of the girl, she said she didn’t tell anyone about the incident at the time it happened because she “didn’t think it was that big of a deal.”
Holt and her daughter moved in with Monde and the women when the child was 5 years old, and left five years later, Holt said. Holt said that when she found out Monde had forced the child to view him naked, touch his penis and have a sexually explicit conversation, she made up her mind to leave the commune.
Although she stayed for five years, Holt said life in the house wasn’t enjoyable and she was ordered to do many things that made her uncomfortable.
Holt, a 25-year-old single mother at the time, met Monde when she auditioned for his band and eventually moved into the home as a way to provide better child care for her daughter, she said in court.
But just two weeks after moving in, she said Monde, who told her he was a personal growth counselor and had a degree from Stanford, ordered her to lose weight, walk around naked as a way to overcome personal insecurities and forced her to offer sex to the other women in the house.
“His whole focus was that I had sexual problems and they were affecting every other aspect of my life,” Holt said. “I was given instructions to be a ‘socialator’ and to ask everybody everyday if they wanted me to perform sex acts or do something to make them feel good physically.”
Holt said she didn’t want to have sex with Monde but was made to at least several times a year. She trusted the other women there and they convinced her to stay and not to tell anyone outside the group about their activities, Holt said.
“I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere alone except to work… and I was told not to tell anybody about what went on in the house because the outside world was ignorant and they couldn’t comprehend it,” she said.
Holt said she left the group several months after learning of the alleged molestation, but had to have a sheriff’s deputy escort her daughter out of the home because Monde originally refused to let the child go.
But during Cantu’s questioning, she conceded she didn’t tell authorities that Monde had allegedly molested her daughter at that time. Instead, she waited several years to confide in a counselor she was seeing about the alleged molestation. The counselor directed her to contact Child Protective Services, she said.
And even then, a police report wasn’t taken until another woman in the house, Wynona Tara, became embroiled in a child custody suit with Monde after she left the commune in 2003. Holt said she signed a declaration that Monde had molested her daughter for Tara to use in her child custody case.
She also admitted that in the declaration she said her daughter was 7 years old when the crime took place but now realizes she made a mistake and the child was 9 or 10.
“I reported it to CPS and I assumed they would take care of it. When Wynona left later and I found out nothing was done about it I went to the sheriff’s,” Holt said.
Cantu consistently questioned Holt about the year of the alleged molestation, when she left the home, how old her daughter was at various times throughout their stay and other date and time-related incidences – many of which didn’t match the dates her daughter had testified to.
After a couple hours of questioning, Wei called Tara, to the stand. However, Superior Court Judge Steven Sanders wrapped the day’s testimony after only several minutes of Tara’s testimony, which will resume today.
The trial is expected to last all week. If convicted of the felony charge, Monde faces up to three years in prison.
Erin Musgrave covers public safety for the Free Lance. Reach her at 637-5566, ext. 336 or em*******@fr***********.com
