SHENANDOAH — A woman became emotional as she testified in court Thursday that a 38-year-old Shenandoah man raped her at a co-worker’s house.
Alberth M. Quinones, of 520 W. Cherry St., appeared for a preliminary hearing on sexual assault charges in connection with the alleged incident June 29. After hearing testimony from the victim and the state trooper who charged the defendant, District Judge Anthony J. Kilker bound all charges over to court.
Quinones remains jailed in Schuylkill County Prison on $100,000 bail.
Assistant District Attorney Karen Byrnes-Noon called the victim to the stand. She testified that she and her co-worker met Quinones at a local bar. The woman said Quinones “grabbed on” her, but she told him she wasn’t interested.
She said she later saw her co-worker and Quinones talking and flirting with each other outside the bar. The victim said Quinones approached her again, but she rebuffed him. The co-worker ultimately requested a ride home, so she drove her back to her residence. The co-worker had also invited the defendant back to her residence, and he followed them in his car, the victim said.
Once they were home, the co-worker and Quinones sat on a couch together, and at this point the victim prepared to leave. However, the co-worker said she needed Quinones to get a condom if was going to stay with her, so he asked the co-worker to accompany him in his car. The victim didn’t want her co-worker to go with him, so he decided to go out by himself, she said. Due to a language barrier, she and the defendant communicated through Google Translate.
After a while, the co-worker invited a male friend to her residence because she assumed Quinones would not return, the woman testified. The victim prepared to leave the home, but when she went outside, she saw Quinones had returned in his vehicle. She alerted her co-worker, who told her to take Quinones upstairs and sit with him until she got her friend to leave the house, the victim said.
The woman said she and Quinones went up to a second-floor bedroom. It was at this point he began assaulting her, she said.
The defendant then removed some of her clothing, forced himself on her and raped her, although she repeatedly rejected his advances, she said.
She later told her co-worker that she needed to leave. Downstairs, the defendant repeatedly apologized to her and then handed her $25, she said.
The woman eventually went home, reported the incident to authorities and then went to a hospital, she said.
Cross-examined by Quinones’ attorney, Public Defender Kent. D. Watkins, the woman said she did not yell out to grab anyone’s attention during the alleged assault because she had dissociated herself from the situation.
State police Trooper Bradley W. Tymchyshyn, called to the stand by Byrnes-Noon, confirmed that the victim appeared to be in a dissociative state when he went to see her at Lehigh Valley Hospital-East and said she appeared tired and upset.
“She just seemed like all the energy was sucked out of her,” Tymchyshyn said.
He said a sexual assault kit conducted on the victim has been stored in the state police crime laboratory in Bethlehem. He said an interview with the defendant was recorded on audio and video at the Frackville state police station.
Quinones, who listened to the court proceedings via an interpreter, did not testify Thursday.
Quinones faces felony charges of rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and sexual assault, along with misdemeanors of indecent assault and indecent exposure.
Watkins entered a not guilty plea to all charges on behalf of the defendant.