Overview
- A judge imposed a term of 45 years to life on Oct. 24, according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.
- A jury in August convicted Carlos Ramirez Valdez, 61, of 11 lewd-act counts and three counts of oral copulation or sexual penetration of a child 10 or younger for crimes committed from 2012 to 2019.
- Prosecutors said one girl was abused from age 4 over seven years, with assaults in a van parked at church or in a basement at Iglesia De Dios Ebenezer in Santa Ana.
- Two other victims described separate assaults: a nine-year-old molested during rides home from church in 2014–2015, and a seven- to eight-year-old abused in a backyard shed over eight months in 2017.
- The case stemmed from a disclosure to a school counselor, followed in January 2020 by reports to police in Garden Grove and Riverside; Valdez was arrested in 2021 while serving as a pastor at another Santa Ana church, and the district attorney publicly condemned the crimes.