Prosecutors: San Jose woman persuaded daughter not to testify against girl’s suspected molester

From Mercury News

She would do almost anything, police and prosecutors contend, to be with her boyfriend again.

Her love for the imprisoned former Milpitas cop was so overpowering that authorities say she persuaded her own teenage daughter not to testify in court against the man charged with sexually molesting her.

Friday afternoon, the San Jose woman and the former cop were reunited — as prisoners. For a few moments, the two were 10 feet away — avoiding each other’s gaze — in Department 23 of Santa Clara County Superior Court, where they both were charged with dissuading a witness.

The 37-year-old woman, whom the Mercury News is not naming so as not to identify her daughter, could be sentenced to up to three years in prison if convicted.

Police believe she and Roosevelt Noble Jr., already facing life in prison on 11 counts of felony molestation, plotted together to prevent the young girl from testifying.

“The DA’s office takes interference in prosecutions seriously, especially when it comes to interference in child molestation cases,” said prosecutor James Leonard. “The sad thing is that we have a mother who really is choosing her boyfriend over her daughter.”

But Dennis Lempert, the attorney who represents the girl, said she had not been persuaded or intimidated by anybody not to cooperate.

“My client in my opinion is being abused by the SJPD and the actions of the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office,”Lempert said.

And Kenneth Mandel, a public defender who is helping to represent Noble, said the case had been sprung unfairly on defense lawyers and “after a quick read, we have a concern about how they are jigsawing the evidence together.”

It is rare, prosecutors admitted, that a mother is prosecuted for trying to stop her daughter from testifying against her accused molester.

This case is based on what police say was a concerted effort between the former officer and the mother to keep her daughter from the stand. Even though prosecutors say the officer confessed to the crimes during a taped phone call with the mother, the case would fall apart without the girl’s testimony.

Evidence for the conspiracy mainly consists of love letters and recorded jailhouse phone calls.

Investigators say Noble called the mother of ?the girl nearly 120 times after his arrest and spoke with her close to 100 times.

One of these conversations, quoted in court documents, came on Nov. 11, 2008, a month and a half before Noble’s preliminary hearing.

Noble: “You have to make sure that she cannot say anything.”

Mother: “Yeah. Yes.”

Lempert was retained soon after that conversation. Investigators believe the girl’s mother arranged for the lawyer. Prosecutors said Noble had at one time inquired into hiring Lempert to defend him.

The girl refused to talk to police immediately after that.

Investigators have long been suspicious that the mother was the driving force behind her daughter’s reluctance to help bring her suspected molester to justice.

In October, the girl told officers that Noble — her mother’s longtime boyfriend — entered her bedroom at night about 10 times starting when she was 12 and inappropriately touched her. The 15-year veteran would show up at their home on his motorcycle, in full police uniform, and spend the night.

But the mother refused to cooperate with the investigation, police said.

Because jail phone calls are regularly recorded, the couple spoke in generalities that investigators believe showed a pattern of organizing the girl’s silence.

The couple soon also used an intermediary for their communications, police said.

But their romance continued. A subsequent search of Noble’s jail cell found photos of the two hidden inside a toilet paper roll.

And for months, according to court records, the couple’s plot worked.

But this week, the girl was told by San Jose detectives that they had evidence that her mother continued to have a relationship with Noble. She soon agreed to testify against him, according to court records.

How, if it’s true, could a mother make such a sacrifice?

It’s unclear, therapists say, but it’s not unusual.

“The average person says, of course I’ll choose my kid. But in some cases the abuser’s parent steps up for the abuser and not the child,” said Ama ?Delevett, a therapist with the Survivors Healing Center in Santa Cruz. “It’s really traumatic for the child.”