DNA links resident of state, ’97 assault

Man now faces charge in Utah

— A national DNA database has connected an Arkansas man convicted of battery and drug charges during the summer to a 14-year-old sexual-assault case in Ogden, Utah.

Linking Sergio Arturo Hernandez, 42, to the 1997 attack and sexual assault in Utah involved three states, several law enforcement agencies and two state crime laboratories.

ADVERTISEMENT

More headlines

On Jan. 23, 1997, the then-22-year-old victim told police that she was walking to work in the early morning when a man grabbed her and dragged her behind Mount Ogden Middle School. Her hands were bound, and she was raped and sodomized, according to court documents.

Ogden police detectives said last week that an arrest in the long-cold case was possible because the Searcy County jail officers collected Hernandez’s DNA this June.

“The [Ogden] officer who took the initial call as a patrolman is now a lieutenant handling the case,” Ogden police Lt. Mike Ashment said Friday. “We’ve been in contact with the victim, and she is willing to assist in the prosecution.”

Hernandez lived about a block from the victim’s residence at the time of the attack, according to a probablecause affidavit.

The time limit for filing a sexual-offense charge, however, has elapsed in the case, so Utah authorities cannot charge Hernandez with rape. Instead, Hernandez has been charged with aggravated kidnapping.

In Searcy County, Hernandez was arrested March 11 after his wife reported to police that he had assaulted her and fired a rifle over her head at their Fantail Drive home in St. Joe.

Sheriff ’s deputies were called to the home after a similar report in July 2009, according to incident reports.

In both 2009 and in March, Hernandez told police that he was a U.S. citizen and that he worked as a guide for Buffalo River Outfitters in St. Joe.

In June, he pleaded guilty to domestic battery, the manufacture and possession of marijuana, and aggravated assault on a family member.

He was sentenced to 30 days in the county jail plus five years of probation.

Searcy County jail records indicate that Hernandez took advantage of a program that allowed him to serve his jail time on weekends. Records indicate he last reported to the jail on July 3.

Sometime after that, Hernandez made his way to Jena, La.

In June, Searcy County jailers collected Hernandez’s DNA because he had been convicted of two felonies. They submitted the samples to the Arkansas Crime Laboratory, whose analysts in July entered the information into the national database called CODIS, the Combined DNA Index System.

The DNA profile collected at the 1997 crime scene in Utah was entered into CODIS in 2004, said Ogden police Sgt. Chris McAllister.

After learning of the DNA match in late September, the Weber County, Utah, county attorney drew up an aggravated-kidnapping warrant for Hernandez.

In early October, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials took Hernandez into custody in Louisiana and planned to deport him because he is not a U.S. citizen. That’s when they discovered an outstanding warrant for him out of Ogden.

Two Ogden detectives traveled to Jena to pick up Hernandez on Oct. 26, McAllister said.

Hernandez appeared before Utah 2nd District Judge Michael Lyon in Ogden on Nov. 21 for a preliminary hearing. Lyon scheduled a March 19 jury trial.

Efforts to determine how or when Hernandez made his way from St. Joe, Ark., to Louisiana or when Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested him were unsuccessful. Calls to that agency weren’t returned Friday evening.

The LaSalle Parish sheriff’s office held Hernandez from Oct. 6 to Oct. 26 for the federal agency until Ogden detectives could make a trip to Louisiana to extradite him.

He listed his St. Joe address as his home when he was booked into the parish jail.

Eric Owens, a detective with the Searcy County sheriff's office, and Searcy County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Chris Carnahan said last week that they had not been notified of the DNA match or Hernandez’s arrest.

Carnahan said he didn’t know that Hernandez had been granted weekend jail service, adding that the sheriff decides how inmates serve their sentences.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/04/2011

Upcoming Events