LOS ANGELES (CNS) – Nine new criminal charges were filed Tuesday against a youth soccer coach who was already charged with murdering a 13-year-old boy and sex-related crimes involving two other teenage boys.
Mario Edgardo Garcia-Aquino — who is charged with the March 28, 2025, slaying of Oscar “Omar” Hernandez — pleaded not guilty through his attorney to eight new counts of sodomy of a person under 16 and one new count of oral copulation of a person under 16 involving one of the two surviving alleged victims.
Garcia-Aquino, now 44, remains jailed without bail while awaiting a hearing to determine if there is sufficient evidence to allow the case against him to proceed to trial.
The murder charge stemming from Hernandez’s death includes the special circumstance allegation of murder during the commission or attempted commission of a lewd act with a child. Prosecutors will decide later whether to seek the death penalty against Garcia-Aquino.
He was also initially charged with one count each of assault with the intent to commit a sexual offense and lewd act on a child 14 or 15 years old involving a different teenage boy who was allegedly sexually assaulted Dec. 10, 2022, at a home in Sylmar where the defendant was living at the time.
He was charged separately — in a case that has since been combined with the murder case — with a felony count of assault with the intent to commit a lewd act involving a 16-year-old boy in Palmdale on Feb. 22, 2024.
Hernandez — who had traveled to Lancaster to see his soccer coach last March 28 — was reported missing two days later and found dead in Oxnard, Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said last year.
Hernandez’s body was discovered last April 2 by the side of a road in Oxnard, but authorities have not announced how the boy was killed.
The district attorney said last April that “certain investigative techniques” were used to find the teen’s body and determine his alleged killer, adding that the information will be detailed in court at the appropriate time.
In a statement, Hernandez’s family said they were “devastated by the unimaginable loss” and “heartbroken that someone entrusted with his care could commit such a horrific act.”
Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna told reporters last year that Garcia-Aquino was a youth travel soccer coach with the Hurricane Valley Boys Soccer Club, working with different age divisions in the Sylmar area and had no reported criminal history.
One of the assault charges involves a teen whose family was “befriended” by Garcia-Aquino and allowed their son to stay with him at his Palmdale residence, according to the sheriff.
The family subsequently notified the sheriff’s Palmdale station about the alleged abuse, Luna said.
In a statement posted on X, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said, “13-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.”
Authorities asked in April for anyone with information about Garcia- Aquino or any other alleged victims to call the Los Angeles Police Department’s Juvenile Division, Abused Child Unit at 818-374-5415 or the sheriff’s Special Victims Bureau at 877-710-5273.
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