The first defendant to face trial among a group of men and boys accused of repeatedly raping a young Texas girl vanished Wednesday during a break in the proceedings, following emotionally charged testimony from the alleged victim.
Eric McGowen, 20, is among 14 adults accused of sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl during a nearly three-month span in 2010. Six juveniles also were charged.
Prosecutors and defense attorneys huddled briefly with Judge Mark Morefield after McGowen failed to return to the courtroom following an afternoon break. The judge then told jurors the trial will go on without him.
Morefield later said a bench warrant had been issued, and McGowen's bail was increased from $35,000 to $250,000. The judge denied a defense motion for a continuance in the case and said the trial will resume Thursday morning.
"Your client left voluntarily," Morefield told defense attorney Matthew Poston.
Poston and prosecutors did not comment outside the courtroom because of a gag order in the case.
McGowen is charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child and faces up to life in prison if convicted.
The girl, testifying using a pseudonym, told jurors about two incidents, one in October 2010 and one the following month, in which she said McGowen and several other men and boys took turns sexually assaulting her while recording the encounters on video.
AP
This undated booking photo provided by the Liberty County Sheriff's Department in Liberty, Texas, shows Eric McGowen. Opening statements were scheduled to begin Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2012, in Liberty in a trial for McGowen, who is charged with aggravated sexual assault of an 11-year-old girl in 2010 in Cleveland, Texas. McGowen is among 14 adults charged in the case. He faces up to life in prison if convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child. (AP Photo/Courtesy the Liberty County Sheriff's Department)
Close The girl briefly broke down in tears as jurors were shown a few minutes of video of an alleged October 2010 sexual assault in a house in Cleveland, a small southeast Texas town where she and the defendants lived.
The girl, who was 11 at the time, said she was brought into what she described as the "baby room" in the house, and that McGowen and others took turns sexually assaulting her. She said the video, which several jurors turned away from, was of her being assaulted by another man charged in the case.
"Did the guys just take turns with you?" prosecutor Joe Warren asked.
"Yes, sir," the girl said.
The girl seemed calm for most of the roughly 1½ hours she testified. She mostly gave short answers to questions, often pausing to stare at the floor or ceiling of the Liberty courtroom before responding.
She described another alleged rape that November that started in a different Cleveland home and continued later at a nearby abandoned trailer.
Asked by Warren if more than 20 males might have assaulted her that day, the girl responded, "Probably."
She also told jurors that McGowen assaulted her with a beer bottle during that incident.
Jurors later were shown police photos of used condoms and condom wrappers found inside and outside the house after the alleged November incident.
Poston questioned the girl for about six minutes, asking whether she twice had told police early in the investigation that she never had been sexually assaulted by McGowen. The girl said she didn't remember saying that.
Prosecutors say the girl was assaulted on at least five occasions from mid-September through early December of 2010.
Eight of the 20 defendants accused in the case have pleaded guilty, including all six juveniles.
Authorities began investigating that December, after one of the girl's friends told a teacher he watched a cellphone video of her being raped in an abandoned trailer.
Three people who have pleaded guilty â€" two adults and a juvenile who has since turned 18 â€" also testified Wednesday.
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