LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. -- An attorney lured from Mexico has been placed in Gwinnett County Jail for allegedly trying to pay off a rape victim.
He's accused of trying to offer the victim money to lie before his client's trial – a client who happens to be his brother.
Now, it's a family reunion – of sorts – at the local jail between the man accused of raping a woman and his brother who is accused of trying to buy her silence.
Prosecutors said back in 2007, Deniel Torrijos raped a Duluth woman who was eight months pregnant in front of her two-year-old daughter.
They also said that he might not be behind bars, Wednesday, if it weren't for a DNA match that came when he was arrested for another crime last year in Indiana.
"He was incited for burglary and rape here in Gwinnett County based on the CODIS hit as well as additional investigation by my office and he was brought back to Georgia," Gwinnett County District Attorney Danny Porter said.
Porter said Torrijos' brother – a lawyer in Mexico – began communicating with the rape victim.
He allegedly offered her $30,000 to change her story. And if that didn't work – there was "Plan B".
"We also knew that their ‘Plan B' was if she didn't take the money, then [they] would make her disappear," Porter said. "So we immediately moved her out of her family home."
That's when prosecutors came up with "Plan C".
They used the victim to lure Hernan Torrijos to the Mall of Georgia so he could give her the money. It also gave police the chance to arrest him for trying to influence a witness.
Porter said the crime struck at the heart of the American legal system and he didn't want to give the lawyer a chance to hide behind the judicial system of Mexico – especially with the victim's life potentially at stake.
"We were legitimately afraid they were going to try and kill her but we also wanted to bring this guy out of Mexico – get him into custody," Porter said. "And now he's out there with his brother at the jail."
