14-year-old says she saw Nicole Agriesti hit pregnant woman
San Martin – A 14-year-old girl said she heard a 21-year-old woman call Xochitl Calderon a “beaner,” then saw the woman and a man kick her once in the “lower stomach,” while laughing, as Calderon stood crying with “blood in her mouth.”
The testimony took place Thursday during a preliminary hearing for Morgan Hill residents Nicole Agriesti, 21, and Charles Peralta, 29, who are charged with assault causing bodily injury with a hate crime enhancement. They have both pleaded not guilty and are each free on $100,000 bail.
Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Susan Bernardini presided over the hearing.
Xochitl Calderon, 32, of Morgan Hill did not attend.
Prosecutor Mark Hood has subpoenaed eight witnesses, six who are Morgan Hill Police officers and two juvenile witnesses. Two of the witnesses testified Thursday.
Charges against Peralta and Agriesti arose from an incident July 21. According to the police report, Calderon told police she was allegedly assaulted by the pair in the parking lot of the Cochrane Village Apartments.
According to Agriesti’s attorney Mark Arnold, the confrontation was initiated by Calderon, and Agriesti was defending herself while Peralta sought to break up the fight.
During Thursday’s hearing, Bernardini also heard testimony from MHPD Officer Scott Silva.
Questioning by Hood and the two defense attorneys focused on Silva’s investigation, the injuries; the hate crime portion of the charges, which was added because Calderon and witnesses told police the suspects yelled racial slurs, was addressed when the juvenile testified.
The teen told the court that was all she witnessed, that she did not see Peralta touch Calderon in any way, but heard him laughing, and that she only saw Agriesti kick Calderon one time.
Silva’s testimony took up the majority of Thursday’s hearing, with Arnold seeming to try to prove Silva had a preconceived idea that Calderon was the victim, not the instigator, and that his further investigation was biased.
Much of his testimony and cross-examination centered around a statement from an 11-year-old resident of the complex, who told Silva he saw a female running by the playground where he was playing, yelling for someone to call 911. He said he left the playground area to go to the parking lot, where he saw, he told Silva, a man holding a woman against a car, but could not tell if the man was hitting the woman because the man’s back was facing him. He also told Silva that a woman was also present, and thought “it was a man and a woman, two against one woman,” Silva said.
The hearing will continue March 9.
