Alleged Victims Testify in Former Waco Teacher’s Indecency Trial
By Olivia Messer
Two girls testified Wednesday that they were inappropriately touched by their former Waco Baptist Academy Spanish teacher when they were 9 years old in the second day of testimony in the trial of Sergio David Bezerra, 54, who is charged with four counts of indecency with a child. The victims, who are now 17 years old, testified before Judge Matt Johnson of the 54th District Court that they experienced inappropriate contact at school and during private piano lessons in 2007. One of the victims said that Bezerra had the two girls sit near his desk during Spanish class while he rubbed their legs and thighs, using the desk as a shield from the other students. There were times, she said, when Bezerra would take her hand and press it to his “private area” and rub her arms so much they turned red. She said that during piano lessons, Bezerra alternated between one girl on his lap and another playing the piano. One alleged victim said he had the girls straddle his lap one at a time, facing him, with their bodies pressed up against his. She said Bezerra also whispered in her ear and rubbed her back. She said she remembered in past forensic interviews saying Bezerra was aroused during some of the lessons. “I just remember sitting there, staring at the wall and thinking, ‘I want this to be over, I want to go home,’ ” she testified. “We just knew nobody else treated us like that and we didn’t really know the words to explain what was going on.” She said Bezerra would lock the door so that he could push them off of his lap when he heard someone coming in. The girls told their parents at the time that they didn’t like sitting on his lap or the way he touched their arms, but when their mother took the stand, she said it didn’t strike her as inappropriate at first. She said she didn’t understand what they meant until one conversation in April during the girls’ bedtime prayers when it hit her. The girls’ mother said when she realized, she immediately took the issue to the school’s principal. Bezerra was arrested in 2007 on the indecency with a child charges after the two girls, who were fourth-grade students at Waco Baptist Academy at the time, reported the alleged abuse. He taught Spanish and Latin at the school for 13 years. He resigned a few months before he was arrested. When Assistant District Attorney Gabrielle Massey asked one of the victims if she felt that her relationship with men, including her father, was different after the interactions with Bezerra, she broke down crying on the stand. “In fourth grade, we would sit on (my dad’s) lap during prayers, but after that it was confusing,” she said. “We really trusted (Bezerra) because he went to our church and he knew our family . . . With my dad, it was like I didn’t want to hug him or touch him after that, and it kind of separated us and we’re not as close as I wish we could be. I should be comfortable with him.” Massey asked if it has affected the victim’s dating life in high school. “It’s kind of hard to date somebody when you don’t want them to touch you,” she answered. The victims’ mother said she tried to protect her daughters’ anonymity so much that the girls continued piano lessons with Bezerra’s wife for the rest of the 2007 school year after she took the allegations to the school’s principal. “We’re a close family, we’re a Christian family,” she said. “We put Jesus first in everything that we do. That’s why we put them in a private school and we go to church. And we wanted to protect them.” The girls’ mother said she moved the girls to another school after the allegations came to light, so that they would not have to be around Bezerra’s family. Difficult time But she said the girls have had a difficult time since, despite her attempts to protect them, as they have grown up and begun to understand what happened when they were younger. The jury also heard Wednesday from a social worker at Baylor who interviewed the girls after they came forward. On Tuesday, the jury heard from another alleged victim, who is now 27 and an elementary school teacher. She said that Bezerra molested her at his Hewitt home when she was a teenager. The woman had a close relationship to Bezerra, but was not one of his students. Bezerra has not been charged in any incidents involving the third victim, and she testified that she only first told of her abuse in 2010, after he already had been arrested on the charges related to the other girls. She said the abuse occurred from when she was 14 years old through her sophomore year of high school. “I feel that by keeping quiet, then in a way I’m contributing to allowing someone to hurt children,” she said Tuesday. Contact: omesser@wacotrib.com
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