Update [4:52 p.m.]: Carrera and Cins have been held to answer on all of the counts against them except two gun-related charges, meaning the case will go to trial and they will now return to custody at the West Valley Detention Center. AVN will report further details about this afternoon's proceedings shortly.
RANCHO CUCAMONGA, Calif.—Mercedes Carrera and her partner Damon Cins sat in a San Bernardino County courtroom Thursday morning, as a prosecutor played an audio recording of the preteen girl they are accused of sexually abusing describe the alleged abuse in graphic detail. In an earlier public statement reported by AVN.com, Carrera said that the alleged victim is her nine-year-old daughter.
Carrerra and Cins have denied the allegations, but in audio recorded in January by San Bernardino Sheriff’s Deputy Steven Theis—who had been called by the nine-year-old’s father—the girl gave graphic descriptions of sexual acts, which she referred to as “cuddle” sessions, which she told Theis were performed on her by her mother and Cins.
Sitting directly behind her defense attorney, Joshua Castro, Carrera appeared to shake her head each time the girl described how Carrera and Cins would touch her vagina. The girl also told Theis that on at least one occasion, one of the couple had inserted a finger into her vagina up to the knuckle.
In the interview, conducted at the home of the girl’s father, the nine-year-old also gave a detailed description of how to use a Hitachi vibrator, which she said that Carrera would use on herself during the “cuddle” sessions. At another point in the interview, the alleged victim said that her mother on occasion would “suck on my clit.”
Cins, sitting behind his attorney Nicola Fitzgerald, was seen to laugh slightly when the alleged victim, referred to only as “Jane Doe,” described his penis as looking “like any other penis.”
Today's hearing, which was postponed from its original scheduled date of July 17 and is on lunch recess at the time of this posting, is intended for a judge to determine whether enough evidence exists to move the case against Carrera and Cins forward.
AVN will report further details following the remainder of the hearing this afternoon.
