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Long Beach man charged with Norma Lopez's murder
A photo of 17-year-old Norma Lopez who disappeared July 15, 2010. She was last seen walking home from summer school. He body was found in an empty field in Moreno Valley five days after she went missing.
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Moreno Valley Police Dept.
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Long Beach man charged with Norma Lopez's murder
Long Beach man charged with Norma Lopez's murder
Riverside County prosecutors have filed murder and kidnapping charges against a Long Beach man accused of killing Moreno Valley teenager Norma Lopez.
Authorities arrested Jesse Torres a week ago, more than a year after 17-year-old Lopez disappeared. Torres' arraignment will take place Thursday.
Prosecutors charged Torres with murder and a special circumstance allegation of kidnapping. The kidnapping charge makes him eligible for the death penalty if he's convicted. Authorities believe the 35-year-old single father used to live across the street from Lopez’s high school — the same place where witnesses spotted her walking home from summer school classes only a year ago. A neighbor found her body in a vacant field five days later.
At a news conference last week, Moreno Valley Police Chief John Anderson declined to say what evidence tied Jesse Torres to the crime.
“I’m not gonna release any details — I know you have questions," Anderson said.
"We’re gonna be working closely with the Riverside County District Attorney’s office; we still have a lot of work to do, and after that we’ll assess when we can release information but it will have to be at the appropriate time and right now is not the appropriate time."
Police released Torres on Monday because they had kept him beyond the 48-hour period during which they can hold a suspect without charging him. Following his release he was promptly re-arrested on the same charges. Prosecutors say they delayed filing charges to conduct an extensive review of the evidence.
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Torres remains in a Riverside jail on $1 million bail.
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