Trial begins for North Bay men charged with San Francisco woman’s kidnapping, rape

The rape trial of two North Bay men will resume Wednesday with testimony to focus on bodily injuries the victim suffered in the 2018 case.

Opening statements took place Tuesday and testimony concluded with prosecutors presenting jurors with grisly images of bruising, abrasions, lacerations and swelling on the San Francisco woman’s face, neck, back, arms and knees.

As images appeared on the Sonoma County Superior Courtroom television, jurors turned their heads toward the defendants: Sonoma resident Christian Quintero, 27, and Novato resident Fredi Lopez-Flores, 36.

The pair sat quietly, often leaning back in their chairs with arms crossed.

They are accused of kidnapping and raping a woman who was 24 years old when she was abducted while waiting for a rideshare in San Francisco’s Mission District in 2018.

Quintero is charged with 21 felonies and 24 sentencing enhancements. Lopez-Flores is charged with 17 felonies and 47 enhancements.

Those charges include kidnapping, robbery and multiple counts related to rape. Each defendant faces life in prison if convicted.

The kidnapping occurred after the victim left a nightclub and called an Uber to take her home.

Realizing she provided a wrong address, investigators say she got out at Stanyan and Fulton streets and called another rideshare company when the defendants pulled up and forced her into their car.

They were driving to Sonoma when the woman found herself next to Quintero in the back seat of a car and he touched her inappropriately, prosecutors said.

She said, “no, no, no,” and he responded by punching her face and wrapping his hands around her neck before raping her, according to Sonoma County Deputy District Attorney Matthew Hubley.

“She feels all the air leaving her body. She cannot breathe,” he told the jury of seven women and five men.

Defense attorneys seized on her inebriated state the morning of April 14, 2018, and stressed to jurors her memory of events was hazy and she failed to identify suspects in lineups on three occasions.

The Uber driver and the victim are expected to testify later in the trial.

“After you hear that testimony, you will have doubt. And that doubt will be reasonable,” Quintero’s attorney, Nicholas McCollough Sandler, told jurors.

Lopez-Flores’ attorney, Gabriel Quinnan, added, “You’re not going to hear any competent evidence at this trial.”

Authorities found the woman after she escaped at a strip mall along Fifth Street West in Sonoma. She flagged down a Safeway employee, who called 911 and stayed with her until authorities arrived.

That employee, William Blake, testified Tuesday he was returning from a lunch break when he found the crying woman in the middle of a road. She carried a boot and sock and was barefoot.

“She said she was raped and beaten,” Blake testified.

When pressed by Sandler, Blake added the woman provided no details about who was responsible.

Investigators identified the suspects after using cellphone data and surveillance video from the Golden Gate Bridge and businesses in San Francisco and Marin and Sonoma counties.

They circulated a description of the car, a black Dodge Magnum associated with Lopez-Flores, and a Novato police officer recognized it from a prior arrest and impounding.

Officials said in 2018 that Lopez-Flores’ cellphone records placed him in the area of the abduction on April 14, 2018, and they showed him crossing the Golden Gate Bridge at the same time as the victim and her cellphone.

Quinnan confirmed his client drove the car that night, but told jurors Lopez-Flores doesn’t speak English and he was unaware of the communication between the victim and Quintero.

Lopez-Flores was arrested June 1, 2018, in San Rafael.

Quintero was identified as a friend of Lopez-Flores and he was arrested June 2, 2018, after officials searched his home in Sonoma.

Both men pleaded not guilty to their charges in August 2018 and have been in custody since their arrests.

Quintero’s bail is set at $4.65 million and Lopez-Flores is being held in lieu of $3.6 million.

In his opening statements, McCollough Sandler told jurors, “the issue in this case will be consent.”

You can reach Staff Writer Colin Atagi at colin.atagi@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @colin_atagi