GILROY
– It’s been four years since a male relative stopped a five-year
pattern of sexually molesting a young Gilroy girl, according to a
Gilroy police detective. Just recently, the girl – now a teen-ager
– decided to tell someone about it.
GILROY – It’s been four years since a male relative stopped a five-year pattern of sexually molesting a young Gilroy girl, according to a Gilroy police detective. Just recently, the girl – now a teen-ager – decided to tell someone about it.
She shared her story with a friend, according to Detective Wes Stanford. That friend urged her to tell an adult, so she told her father. The next day, her father took his daughter to the Gilroy Police Department to report the alleged abuse to a police officer.
The upshot: Shortly afterward, police officers arrested James Michael Caudill, 43, Monday afternoon. He now faces two felony counts of aggravated sexual assault on a child under the age of 14 – which, if found guilty, would send him to prison for 30 years to life.
Aggravated sexual assault means that the sex act in question was against the victim’s will and involved force, threat or “duress,” which means the victim was too afraid to resist. Stanford described the acts in question as “contact of a sexual nature” but confirmed that at least one act involved sexual penetration.
Sexual molestation cases involving children are on the increase this year. Caudill’s arrest is at least the sixth in the past two months.
“It’s been freaking crazy,” Stanford said Thursday. “I don’t know what the hell happened. … This is very much out of the norm. This is the busiest I’ve been since I’ve been here.”
Stanford, who since January 2003 has investigated sex crimes and maintained the city’s sex-offender registry, said he had roughly 60 hours of overtime in the past month. He said Cpl. Hank Snow, who did his job for five years previously, agreed that right now there is a particularly high volume of cases.
The girl’s story gave police enough information to arrest Caudill, Stanford said. Police reportedly saw Caudill outside his 9050-B Church St. home as they approached, but he had left by the time they arrived. It appeared he had fled to a relative’s house, Stanford said. Shortly afterward, that relative drove him to the police station.
“He came in the front lobby and turned himself in,” Stanford said.
Caudill is now being held in the Santa Clara County jail without bail.
He was arraigned in court Wednesday and has been assigned a public defender. He is scheduled to reappear in court Tuesday afternoon to enter a plea.
Caudill has not worked for some time but instead received disability payments. Stanford said he did not know what kind of profession Caudill once held.
“He told us that he (had) some kind of a work-related injury,” Stanford said. “His wife works.”
Caudill spent most of his time around his house and does not appear to have been involved in any community activities involving children, Stanford said.
So why are so many people coming forward now with allegations of sex abuse? Stanford said he suspects that sex-abuse victims come forward when they hear about other, similar cases being prosecuted. Therefore, every report sparks more like it.
The teen-age years tend to be when a past victim will reveal past abuse, Stanford said. They are beginning to mature and gain perspective by then, he said, and they have often lost some of their fear of the molester.
“Teen-agers, it starts to bother them,” Stanford said. “They get to the point where it drives them crazy.”
