Sex Offender Gets Over 39 Years For Assaulting 8 Victims

By PAUL ANDERSON

City News Service

SANTA ANA, CA — A registered sex offender has been sentenced to more than 39 years in prison for assaulting eight victims in a crime spree around Santa Ana.

Moises Hernandez, 32, was convicted Sept. 3 of one count of assault with the intent to commit a sexual offense, four counts of indecent exposure with a prior conviction, a count of lewd acts on a child 14 or 15 years old, a count of sexual penetration by foreign object and force, all felonies, as well as a misdemeanor count of touching an intimate part of another person and resisting arrest.

In a turbulent hearing Friday, Hernandez spat at attorneys and deputies while railing against the judge in expletive-laden rants while threatening a prosecutor and investigator. At one point, Hernandez repeatedly kicked the wall while in the courtroom cage as Orange County Superior Court Judge John Zitny made his rulings.

Zitny indicated that Hernandez was attempting to exploit a mitigating factor for sex-offender crimes if the defendant was a victim of human trafficking as Hernandez made wild allegations about prosecutors ordering sex assaults on his family members.

Hernandez won the right to represent himself in the trial, but opted for his stand-by attorney, Laurence Young, to be his attorney for the sentencing.

Young made a motion for a new trial based on an argument that he was pressed into duty unprepared during the trial when Hernandez was either removed from court for his disruptions or refused to participate.

Before Young was able to make the motion, Hernandez said he wanted to represent himself again, which Zitny denied.

"It's been five weeks since the verdicts and you haven't done anything on the case," the judge told him. "You're still not ready and Mr. Young is ready."

Zitny said Hernandez lost his right to petition to represent himself because "of all the trouble you've caused" during the trial.

Deputy District Attorney Thomas Farnell argued that Hernandez was warned multiple times his stand-by attorney would not be ready to jump right into the trial and aid him, and noted that Zitny warned Hernandez about that when he misbehaved or refused to come to court.

Zitny also advised Hernandez to get his witnesses ready, but they didn't come to court. He noted that his family members, who the defendant said would be witnesses, had restraining orders against him.

Hernandez shouted at Farnell, "You want to talk about my sister. You better watch out for your kids, you (expletive)."

The judge interjected, "He didn't say anything bad about your family," prompting Hernandez to tell Zitny, "You better watch out, judge."

When Zitny asked the defendant if he was threatening him, Hernandez said he was referring to a potential complaint to a state watchdog agency for judges.

"The jury was rigged," Hernandez shouted as Zitny read aloud the verdicts in the case.

After Young tried to appeal to the judge for a reduced sentence, Hernandez changed his posture.

"I want to say I apologize," Hernandez told Zitny while also making an unfounded allegation that a prosecutor told an investigator to rape his sisters.

A probation report referred to trauma from childhood abuse of the defendant, but Zitny was skeptical.

He said the defendant made "self-serving statements" to probation officials.

"I think this was contrived," Zitny said of Hernandez's claims of sex trafficking.

"He said human traffickers shot his brother," Zitny said as Hernandez shouted, "I've got proof. He's in a wheelchair!"

Hernandez said, "I suspect some of the cops are involved" in his human trafficking allegations.

He said his sister was a victim of human trafficking when she was 16 and was "raped."

"Where is your sister?" Zitny asked him.

"She was here last time," he replied. But now they are too fearful of coming forward, he added.

"Your family has restraining orders against you," and the defendant's investigator found no evidence to back up his claims, the judge said.

As the judge pressed on with the sentencing, Hernandez loudly kicked the wall while shouting, "You better watch out, you (expletives). You (expletive) pigs!"

To Zitny he said, "(Expletive) you. I give you an opportunity to modify my verdict and you don't even acknowledge me... You (expletive) coward."

Zitny sentenced Hernandez to 39 years and eight months in prison, the maximum punishment. He ordered the defendant to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

Hernandez was given credit for 859 days behind bars.

A woman who had her 3-month-old in a stroller and her 5-year-old daughter in tow was walking through the Northgate Market parking lot at about 4:15 p.m. on June 4, 2024, at 1120 S. Bristol St. when Hernandez approached her from behind on a bike and groped her backside, Santa Ana Police Officer Natalie Garcia said when the defendant was arrested. He also wrapped his hands around the 5-year-old, Garcia said.

About an hour earlier, he exposed himself to two teenagers and groped one of the girls near Santa Ana High School, Garcia said.

Hernandez had pleaded guilty in June 2023 to two felony counts of indecent exposure with a prior conviction and a misdemeanor count of resisting arrest for an incident on Nov. 28, 2022, according to court records.

Hernandez pleaded guilty in December 2021 to indecent exposure and resisting arrest, both misdemeanors, according to court records.

He was convicted of robbery in November 2017, but acquitted of misdemeanor counts of child annoyance.

According to a probation violation petition filed in June 2023, he was ordered to register for a sex offender treatment program but failed to show proof of enrollment and was cited for going to Centennial Park in Santa Ana when he was not allowed to.

He was also accused of registering with Costa Mesa police as a transient, but was actually residing at his mother's home there, probation officials said.

In 2021, he exposed himself to youths at a boys and girls club in Fountain Valley, according to probation officials.

— City News Service