For the first time since Gilroy police busted up an alleged prostitution ring in January involving a 13-year-old girl, the victim has testified against the man the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office says “lured” her into having sex for money with different men in Salinas and Seaside motels.
During the first part of a preliminary hearing Tuesday at the South County Courthouse in Morgan Hill, the Gilroy girl took the witness stand and faced 22-year-old Yahya Abdul Malik, also of Gilroy, who she said had sexual intercourse with her and promised her “fine things as long as she was making money for him.”
The young girl, over the span of several hours, detailed everything from her first encounter with Malik in a parking lot on First Street after he followed her in his car and eventually got her phone number, to the sexual acts she performed on 10 men – “Johns” or “tricks” who paid for the acts.
“The man would give me the money, I would do his sexual favor and I would give all the money to Yahya,” the victim explained before Superior Court Judge Edward Lee.
Deputy District Attorney Nahal Iravani-Sani, who leads the prosecution’s charge against Malik and 21-year-old Ivan Diego Wade, of Seaside, said she admires the victim’s strength for testifying against the men charged with felony human trafficking causing a minor victim to engage in a commercial sex act, procuring a minor under 16 for prostitution, among other charges.
“It took a lot of courage for her to testify. The fact that she testified so truthfully and credibly, it went as well as it could have,” Iravani-Sani said of the detailed account the victim shared at the proceeding.
Malik and four other suspects were arrested following an investigation by the Gilroy Police Department into the whereabouts of the young girl, who was reported as a runaway by her mother Jan. 14. Police found the missing girl at the Travel Inn at 5530 Monterey Road two days later.
At this stage in the case, the preliminary hearing involved charges brought against Malik and Wade for their alleged involvement in the ring.
Malik was slapped with two additional felonies: committing a lewd or lascivious act on a child under fourteen and oral copulation with a minor, Iravani-Sani explained. His bail is set at $950,000.
During her testimony, the victim explained Malik encouraged her to be part of the “escort business” as a way to escape her life at home and school and that prostitution was the only was she knew “he made money.”
“I wanted out of how I was living before he offered me a rich life by prostitution,” the girl said.
After allegedly having intercourse with the victim in the garage of his mother’s Gilroy home, Malik told one of his brothers that the she was “the next big thing,” meaning she would make a lot of money for him in the escort business, according to her testimony.
At no point during the hearing did she recall Malik ever asking how old she was.
“Even if the victim told him she was 18 or consented to this, minors aren’t legally allowed to give consent,” Iravani-Sani said. “Under the law, ignorance of age or even a reasonable mistake as to age is not a defense. Even if the girl looks older, it’s his responsibility to find out how old she is.”
On Sept. 5, during a preliminary hearing in Riverside Superior Court, Malik was cleared of previous, separate charges stemming from his arrest in mid-August for kidnapping, sexual assault and pimping charges after the alleged victim recanted her story and told the court she fabricated her testimony.
According to John Hall, spokesman for the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office, all charges against Malik and four others – including his brothers Muhammad and Ibrahim Malik – were dropped, and they were released from custody.
“In my mind, (Malik) has been at this a long time,” Iravani-Sani said.
Both Malik and Wade will appear for the final part of the preliminary hearing at 10 a.m. in Department 110 of the South County Courthouse Mar. 21.
