Judge OKs confession in abuse trial

PROVO — A man who police say confessed to sexually abusing elderly women at the care center where he worked will stand trial on charges against him after a judge decided his confession can be used as evidence during the trial.

Jesus Partida, 34, faces 15 felony sex-abuse charges in 4th District Court.

Partida's defense attorney tried to argue recently that the man made up the sex-abuse story to get out of a failing marriage. And because it was concocted, said attorney Joseph Jardine, it shouldn't be allowed as evidence.

That argument didn't pass muster with the judge, however, and so Partida's jury trial will start as scheduled.

"This court finds that based on the totality of the circumstances and by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant's confession is trustworthy," 4th District Judge Steven Hansen wrote in a ruling Tuesday. "Therefore the defendant's motion to exclude confession is denied."

Last July, Partida approached police with allegations of sexual abuse while working as a certified nursing assistant at Heritage Care Center in American Fork.

Police say he told them he fondled, touched and performed sex acts with 10 women who suffered from dementia or Alzheimer's disease.

In a daylong hearing Thursday, Deputy Utah County Attorney Dave Sturgill and Partida's attorney, Joseph Jardine, argued their legal positions. The confession is important to the prosecution because it is the key piece of evidence.

Most of the women have since died and there are no other eyewitnesses to the alleged abuse.

Sturgill said he is elated with judge's ruling and feels confident about the trial.

Jardine did not immediately return calls from The Deseret Morning News.

In the past, Utah has held prosecutors responsible to produce evidence of a crime other than just the confession. That was known as the "corpus delicti" rule.

However, with a 2003 Utah Supreme Court Decision — State v. Mauchley —Utah's Supreme Court traded that Latin-labeled standard for the "trustworthiness" standard.

Now, after proving the trustworthiness of a confession, prosecutors can use it regardless of other available evidence.

"In cases where there is no evidence of a crime independent of the confession, the State may establish trustworthiness of the confession with other evidence typically used to bolster the credibility and reliability of an out of court statement," Hansen wrote in his ruling, quoting previous case law.

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