Jose Alfredo Aguilar Cruz's sexual assault charge stayed in Calgary kidnapping case
Meghan Grant | CBC News | Posted: May 30, 2016 6:09 PM | Last Updated: May 30, 2016
Edvin Rolando Cruz Cerrato and Berlin Noel Valle Banegas wanted on Canada-wide warrants
Charges have been stayed against one of the three people accused of kidnapping and sexually assaulting a woman overnight back in September.
Jose Alfredo Aguilar Cruz, 38, who also goes by the name Alfredo Cruz was supposed to appear in court on Monday but court officials confirm the sexual assault charge he faced has been stayed.
"My client is happily home with his family in Honduras," said Cruz's lawyer Krysia Przepiorka.
The other two who are wanted on Canada-wide warrants in connection with the crime are still at large and investigators fear they may have left the country.
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The woman, in her 40s, was leaving a bar in the 1800 block of 35th Street S.E. when she was forced into a white SUV. The woman was then taken to a home somewhere in east Calgary and sexually assaulted by three men.
She fled the next morning and contacted police.
It took investigators five months to lay charges.
Both Edvin Rolando Cruz Cerrato, also known as Rolando Cruz, 45, and Berlin Noel Valle Banegas, also known as Noel Valle, 25, are wanted on warrants for sexual assault and kidnapping.
Cruz Cerrato is described as Hispanic, approximately 160 pounds, 5 feet 5 inches, with brown eyes and greying black hair. Valle is described as Hispanic, about 170 pounds, 5 feet 7 inches, with brown eyes and black hair.
Investigators with the sex crimes unit believe the men were living in Calgary, but say the pair may have ties to other parts of Canada and Honduras.
CBC News has reached out to the assigned prosecutor in an effort to find out why the charge was stayed.
Stayed charges can be brought back within one year, though it's rare for that to happen.