Richard Santa Ana, 44, formerly of Kyle, was found guilty of two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child and one count of indecency with a child by sexual contact for repeatedly drugging and sexually assaulting a teenage daughter of a friend. Santa Ana was sentenced to a total of 218 years in prison by Hays County District Court Judge Joe Pool, according to a press release issued by Hays County District Attorney Kelly Higgins.
Evidence during the punishment phase included testimony from a previous victim that the defendant had sexually assaulted in 2007.
Judge Pool announced he was ordering the sentences to run consecutively, or “stacked,” requiring the first sentence to be served before the second sentence can begin and the second to be served before the third begins. Santa Ana must also register as a sex offender for the rest of his life, and, on behalf of the victim, a lifetime protective order was put into place against him.
“This gives notice to others in the community that we’re not going to accept this type of behavior,” Pool stated. “This defendant had already shown he won’t be rehabilitated. … We asked the Court to make sure he wouldn’t be able to reoffend again. Both of the girls who came forward and told their stories in this trial were extremely brave, and we are grateful we were able to get justice for them.”
The case was investigated by Kyle Police Department Detective Jerritt Bean and included scientific analysis by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification and NMS Labs. The State’s trial team that appeared on behalf of Hays County District Attorney Kelly Higgins in this matter included prosecutors Whitaker and Phillip Guebert, Victim’s Assistance Coordinator Annalise Brewer-Hall, Investigator Sergeant Rheanne Garcia, Legal Assistant Avery Slocum and Digital Media Evidence and Discovery Coordinator Mercedes Pena.
RICHARD SANTA ANA
