Mario Edgardo Garcia-Aquino, 44, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, faces additional child sex charges following earlier accusations that he raped and murdered a teenage boy he coached, Fox News reports. The latest charges include multiple counts of sodomy and oral copulation with a minor under 16.
After illegally entering the United States, Garcia-Aquino reportedly settled in California’s San Fernando Valley, where he worked as a youth soccer coach. His coaching duties often took him to Whitsett Fields Park in North Hollywood—an area known for youth soccer matches and the place where he allegedly met 13-year-old Oscar Hernandez. Authorities say Garcia-Aquino sexually assaulted and killed the boy.
This week, prosecutors with the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office filed nine new charges against Garcia-Aquino, according to an updated complaint obtained by Fox News Digital. The additions include eight counts of sodomy involving a minor under 16 and one count of oral copulation with a minor under 16. Family members said Hernandez left his home in Sun Valley to meet his soccer coach before being found dead along a roadside.
According to media reports, Garcia-Aquino entered a plea of not guilty through his attorney.
Court filings from the Superior Court of California show that the murder of Oscar Hernandez occurred on March 28 during a sexual assault. The complaint also mentions another incident involving the rape of a child in December 2022, as well as a separate assault from February 22, 2024. The filings allege that Garcia-Aquino repeatedly abused a minor between September 2022 and July 2023. With these new accusations, the El Salvadoran national could face the death penalty if convicted.
A statement from the Department of Homeland Security last year condemned the crime, saying, “Thirteen-year-old Oscar ‘Omar’ Hernandez was an innocent child who was exploited and killed by this depraved illegal alien who should have never been in this country,” the Department of Homeland Security said last year.
The department added that, under the current administration, “child predators, pedophiles and murderers will be hunted down and removed from America’s communities.”
In another alleged assault involving a 14-year-old boy, investigators say Garcia-Aquino befriended the victim’s family through a local soccer program and eventually convinced them to allow the boy to spend the night at his home.
Hernandez’s brother told CBS News he believes Garcia-Aquino deliberately targeted families living in the U.S. without legal immigration status.