California foster dad sentenced to 7 years for abusing child torture victims

A California man was sentenced Friday to seven years in prison for abusing foster children he had assigned to care for in his home, including some who had been previously tortured by their parents.

Marcelino Olguin, 65, was handcuffed and led away by sheriff’s deputies in a courtroom in Riverside after a brief sentencing hearing. Olguin previously pleaded guilty to lewd acts on a child, false imprisonment and injuring a child, while his wife, Rosa, and adult daughter, Lennys, pleaded guilty to child cruelty. The women were each sentenced to four years of formal probation.

“Today’s sentencing marks a significant step in delivering justice to the victims who endured unimaginable abuse,” Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin said in a statement. “These children were placed in a position of vulnerability after surviving intense trauma, only to be further exploited by someone who was entrusted with their care.”

Attorneys for the Olguins said the plea arrangement allowed for the women to be spared prison time.

“My client saved his family,” Paul Grech, Marcelino Olguin’s lawyer, said after the hearing. He declined to discuss the case further.

The Olguin family was tasked with caring for the children after they were rescued from horribly abusive conditions in their parents’ home in the Southern California community of Perris. Their parents, David and Louise Turpin, pleaded guilty in 2019 to torture and years of abuse that included shackling some of their 13 children and starving them and providing only a minimal education. The Turpin parents were sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years.

A report found that the social service system failed the Turpin children, who ranged in age from 2 to 29 when they were rescued by authorities from their parents’ home after their 17-year-old sister escaped and called 911. Eventually six of the children were placed with the Olguins.

Attorneys representing some of the Turpin children filed a civil lawsuit against Riverside County alleging the Olguins abused minors in their care. The couple hit the children in the face with sandals, pulled their hair, forced them to eat their own vomit and made them sit in a circle and recount the trauma they had experienced in their parents’ home, the attorneys wrote in the lawsuit filed in 2022. The suit also accused Marcelino Olguin of sexual abuse.

Kia Feyzjou, who represented Lennys Olguin, said some of the allegations may have been a “little exaggerated,” but winning a case with so much public scrutiny would have been difficult. Doug Ecks, who represented Rosa Olguin, said his client and her daughter might be seen as enablers but didn’t face charges of abuse to the same extent.

“When there was a resolution that involved no custody, that seemed in the best interest of everybody,” Ecks said.

On Friday, a victim’s advocate read to the court a statement prepared by one of the Turpin children who had stayed in the Olguins’ home.

“All I wanted was to finally have a loving family and to recover from my trauma, but unfortunately I did not receive that,” the statement said. The victim, who was not named, is still recovering and learning to trust but forgives the family in an act of faith, the statement said.

Taxin writes for the Associated Press