Geronimo Aguilar trial continues with testimony of alleged sex acts

Fort Worth Star-Telegram/June 17, 2015

By Mitch Mitchell

Fort Worth, Texas -- A young minister who later became internationally known did not attempt to hide that he was having sex with a 13-year-old girl while her mother was nearby, according to witnesses at the minister’s trial on Wednesday.

Geronimo Aguilar, 45, is accused of sexually assaulting the girl and her sister in the mid-1990s when they all lived in Fort Worth and Grapevine.

Aguilar left Texas in 2003 for Richmond, where he founded the Richmond Outreach Center, known as the ROC, and was pastor until he was fired in 2014. Last week, the South Richmond church announced it was changing its name to Celebration Church and Outreach Ministry.

The girls’ mother is in the Tarrant County jail awaiting trial on a charge of sexual assault of a child under 17.

Testifying under the pseudonym April Moore, the older daughter, now 32, testified Tuesday at Aguilar’s trial. She testified that Aguilar repeatedly sexually assaulted her, most often in 1996 and 1997 when Aguilar and his wife shared residences with the sisters and their parents. Moore said Aguilar apologized to her and cried after he had sex with her younger sister.

“He said it was just once,” Moore said.

On Wednesday, Moore’s sister, testifying under the pseudonym Lake Valley, told the jury that Aguilar played strip poker with the girls.

“We all went to a house in Arlington and had a sleepover with Geronimo,” Valley said. “Our parents knew we were going. April, me and Geronimo played strip poker. … I was 11 or 12.”

Another witness Wednesday was once a teenage boyfriend of Moore. Now living in San Antonio, Carl Everett White testified that he did not like Aguilar.

White said that once when he walked into the residence in the 900 block of Sargent Street, Moore’s mother tried to stop him.

“I went in the house, and her mother was telling me that I needed to go, and Mr. Aguilar was walking out of April’s room adjusting his pants, and I say, ‘What the hell is going on here,’ ” White said. “They got me out of the house.”

In 2014, a Tarrant County grand jury indicted Aguilar on two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child. The maximum sentence on the charge is life in prison. The indictment also includes three counts of sexual assault of a child under 17 and three counts of indecency with a child, all second-degree felonies with a maximum sentence of 20 years.

The trial is scheduled to continue today in state District Judge Louis Sturns’ court.

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