The sexual abuse at the hands of her stepfather began when she was just 11. He would sneak into her room at night and assault her, court documents show. By age 13 she told her sister. At least one of the attacks was described in a diary the two girls shared — a record their mother took to Malden police when she found out about the ongoing abuse.
For another three years the girl and her mother waited for justice — and they waited in fear while the man who betrayed the trust of a child walked free.
Last month, Juliano Santana, 49, abducted the 16-year-old as she walked home from school along Great Road in Acton, authorities said. Her body was later found in his car in the parking lot of her Acton residence alongside that of Santana. Both were dead of apparent gunshot wounds.
The GPS device on his ankle helped police locate him and his victim after the abduction was reported.
The death of a child is always incredibly sad; the preventable death of a child who had already suffered so much is an unspeakable tragedy.
Santana, as it turns out, was free on $30,000 bail with that GPS device and a court order to refrain from being in the company of anyone under the age of 18. The family also had a court-issued restraining order against him. He was the beneficiary of repeated delays in his trial.
There was, of course, no incentive for Santana to demand a speedy trial. He was, after all, free, even as his victim and her family had to remain in the prison of their own fear.
The state does have a law that permits the pretrial detention of those accused of any crime that “has as an element of the offense the use, attempted use or threatened use of physical force.”
But a 2019 decision by the state Supreme Judicial Court created a huge loophole in the pretrial detention process, ruling that the law around dangerousness hearings in certain cases of child sexual abuse was unconstitutionally vague.
The decision came in the case of David W. Barnes, who at age 43 was charged with using social media to lure a 15-year-old girl to a hotel for sex. In his concurring opinion, Justice David Lowy wrote that the “counterintuitive result [of the decision] requires further discussion and consideration by the Legislature … the pretrial detention statute does not list rape aggravated by age difference as a qualifying offense. Given today’s result, the Legislature may choose to consider this omission with alacrity.”
Well, the Legislature rarely does anything “with alacrity.” So now — more than five years later — there is once again talk in the wake of the Acton murder of adding child rape to the list of offenses that would qualify for a dangerousness hearing.
Governor Charlie Baker made at least two attempts to broaden the dangerousness statute, first in 2018 and again the very day that SJC decision came out. His was a wider attempt to expand the list of offenses that may be grounds for a dangerousness hearing but also to reform the process, giving prosecutors more leeway in when to ask for a dangerousness hearing and giving judges more information, including past criminal histories.
Civil libertarians raise serious concerns about any pretrial detention — which, by definition, takes away a defendant’s freedom before they’ve been convicted of anything. But some people really are an imminent danger to the community, and dangerousness hearings at least bring a form of due process to making such determinations.
This year Senator John Velis is taking up the cause with legislation that would similarly expand the list of offenses that would be considered for a dangerousness hearing to include “a sex offense involving a child” and assaults on public employees such as police or firefighters “engaged in the performance of his or her duties.” The bill is still being held in the Judiciary Committee, along with a similar effort by Senate minority leader Bruce Tarr.
“The unfortunate reality is that there are instances that happen in which really dangerous individuals are still out on our streets,” Velis told the Globe. “The Commonwealth has their hands tied behind their backs.”
That bill includes another timely fix to state law — making it a separate crime, punishable by imprisonment, to remove or damage a court-ordered GPS device. Over the weekend North End restaurateur Patrick Mendoza, who faces attempted murder charges, was taken into custody after allegedly cutting off the GPS device he wore as a condition of his release on bail.
A police report quoted Mendoza as saying he cut the device off because “I’m tired and sick of it.” Under the proposed law, the very act would be “prima facie evidence” that nothing will assure the presence of the defendant at trial except detention.
Now keep in mind, even a change in the law on dangerousness only means prosecutors can get a shot at putting a defendant behind bars to await trial. There are no slam dunks here. Ultimately the decision will still rest with a judge, who can only go on the evidence that is allowed to be placed before him.
But when a justice of the state’s highest court warns that the Legislature ought to have a second look at the law, that ought to be taken to heart — preferably before one more tragedy is linked to its lack of diligence.
Editorials represent the views of the Boston Globe Editorial Board. Follow us @GlobeOpinion.