18-YEAR OLD RUN OFF ROAD, RAPED, AND BEATEN

Woman says she was run off road, raped
Two arrested shortly after crime reported in Central Texas
10:02 PM CDT on Friday, June 30, 2006
Associated Press

GROESBECK, Texas – A Central Texas woman was recuperating at a Temple hospital after she reported being run off a rural road, kidnapped, and then raped and beaten by her abductors. The 18-year-old woman was in stable condition Thursday following surgery.

She walked and crawled a half-mile to find help after her abductors left her for dead along a highway early Wednesday morning, authorities said. "She spent more than two hours in hell," Limestone County Sheriff Dennis Wilson said.

Sheriff Wilson said Javier Guzman Martinez, 17, and Noel Darwin Hernandez, 22, both of Mexia, were arrested in the crime and charged Thursday with aggravated assault and aggravated kidnapping.

Two men began following the woman late Tuesday night as she left Mexia, about 40 miles east of Waco, where she was visiting friends, authorities said. The attackers didn't know the woman.

The woman told investigators that she was driving at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday on a state highway toward her home in a Limestone County town when a car rammed her sport utility vehicle and forced her off the road, Sheriff Wilson said.

The woman told investigators that the men forced her into their car and then drove on rural county roads while they sexually assaulted, stabbed and beat her, Sheriff Wilson said.
The woman said the men left her in a ditch about a mile south of Coolidge, where she pretended to be dead until they left.

She found help at a nearby mobile home. Dena Lincoln said the woman, covered in blood, came to her door about 4:30 a.m. "I will never, as long as I live, get that look that was on her face out of my mind," Ms. Lincoln said. "She kept saying, 'I'm going to die. I'm going to die.' I told her, 'No, honey, you are going to be all right. We are going to get you some help.' "
The woman was flown by helicopter to a Temple hospital with numerous cuts and stab wounds, including an injury that endangered one eye, Sheriff Wilson said.

Investigators searched the area on Wednesday with the description of the attackers given by the women. Officers found Mr. Martinez at his Mexia residence. Sheriff Wilson said he confessed and told officers of Mr. Hernandez's involvement. Officials tracked him to a Waco bus station, where he was arrested Wednesday night. Sheriff Wilson said both men are apparently in the United States illegally and will be held without bail on immigration charges. Mr. Hernandez is from Honduras, and Mr. Martinez is from Mexico, the sheriff said.