After sexually abusing an eight-year-old girl, a former elementary school teacher is off to prison.
A Harris County jury sentenced Miguel Angel Yepez, 41, to 15 years for felony indecency with a child, following a three-day trial in the 185th district court, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office announced Friday.
“The jury spoke loud and clear,” Assistant District Attorney Ashley Guice said in a statement. “This is a horribly sad example of betrayal by someone entrusted with protecting our children.”
Yepez’s eight-year-old victim was a second grader in his class at Harvard Elementary School in the Heights during the 2010 to 2011 school year, when he abused her. The girl testified against Yepez in court, and so did her mother, who told the jury in tears that “she felt she had served her daughter to Yepez on a ‘silver platter,'” the DA’s office said.
The mom recalled during her testimony that she had specifically asked Yepez to watch over her daughter, who had become vulnerable while her parents were going through a divorce, she said.
The DA’s office said a second victim, now an adult and a mother herself, also testified about being abused by Yepez back in 2002, but did not tell anyone at the time because she was afraid.
This article appears in Jul 13-19, 2017.
