Trial of Reynaldo Resendez: Victim, family members give emotional testimony in indecency with child case.
Updated: Apr 26
It was an emotional day of testimony in the 266th Judicial District Court on Wednesday when the trial for a man accused of indecency with a child got underway.
Prosecutors allege that 39-year-old Reynaldo Resendez Jr. fondled a 15-year-old girl inside her family’s Stephenville home on Christmas Eve in 2021.
Erath County Assistant District Attorney Jett Smith called the now 17-year-old victim to the stand where she told jurors what Resendez allegedly did to her.
She described that in the early morning hours of Dec. 24, 2021 she was asleep in her bed when she woke up to Resendez touching her.
“I woke up to him lying in my bed touching me,” she said.
She tearfully described how he fondled her breasts underneath her shirt and moved to her panties.
“I got scared and didn’t know what else to do,” she said.
The victim said Resendez got off the bed and went to the bathroom before heading back upstairs.
Then she called her older sister who came home immediately.
The sister, too overcome with emotion to speak at times, cried when she told jurors that she became “violently angry” after learning what Resendez had done.
She said that when she arrived at the family’s home, she grabbed a knife from the kitchen and charged upstairs to confront him.
A short time later, a call was made to the Stephenville Police Department and officers were on scene within minutes.
Bodycam footage from police interaction with Resendez was played for the jury and showed the defendant telling officers that he woke up from a “dead sleep” to the women screaming “at the top of their lungs.”
He claimed he had no idea what all the fuss was about.
Resendez is being represented by Lubbock attorneys Audie Reese and Matthew Hawkins.
The trial is expected to last for the remainder of the week.
