Former Sailor and Convicted Serial Rapist Pleads Guilty to 2010 Attack

NORFOLK, Va. – Amin Jason Carl Garcia, 26, of New York, New York, a convicted serial rapist and former U.S. Navy sailor, pleaded guilty today to charges relating to the attack of a former Army officer while she was taking a shower at Camp Arifjan in Kuwait in 2010.  

In a statement of facts filed with the plea agreement, on April 29, 2010, the U.S. Army Criminal Investigative Division (CID) Kuwait, was contacted regarding the assault and attempted rape of a U.S. Army officer in the female shower trailer at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait. According to the victim, approximately three minutes into her shower, an unknown black male whose face was almost fully covered by a military tan undershirt, pulled her from the shower to the opposite end of the trailer and ordered her to face away from him. The victim resisted her attacker, who subsequently cut her numerous times with a box cutter type knife and punched her several times in the head.  At one point during the attack, the attacker stated that he “guessed” at that point he would have to kill her. Eventually, the victim complied with her attacker and stated that she would do what he wanted to do, but begged that he not cut her any more.  Shortly after the comment, the attacker fled the scene on foot and the victim ran to her tent to get help before being transported to the medical facility in Camp Arifjan. 

According to court documents, while processing the crime scene investigators recovered a shirt covered in what appeared to be blood. That shirt was believed to be the shirt that was covering the face of the attacker.  Also discovered at the crime scene was what appeared to be a trail of blood that led from the female shower trailer to a washroom in which additional blood was collected. Upon testing of the material collected by the U.S. Criminal Investigative Laboratory (USACIL), it was determined that the stains were produced by blood and two DNA profiles were developed.  One DNA profile was that of the female known victim, and the other was identified as from an unknown male with Type A blood.  The unknown male Type A blood profile also matched the blood found in the washroom. Subsequent investigative steps identified Garcia as a suspect in the assault at Camp Arifjan.  These steps included a check of military records, which confirmed that Garcia was in the military and had been assigned to Camp Arifjan at the time of this assault. 

According to court documents, in December 2013, Garcia was still in the U.S. Navy Reserves. On the weekend of Dec. 14, 2013, when Garcia was serving his reserve drill period at the Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC), Bronx, New York, NCIS investigators shadowed him and, after Garcia ate lunch, agents seized the fork, two cups, and banana to recover swabs for DNA analysis.  The analysis of the biological material seized by investigators revealed that it matched the DNA that was obtained from the assault of the victim at Camp Arifjan in April 2010.

Garcia’s DNA also was a match for DNA recovered at the scene of a sexual assault on a Norfolk woman in 2008. The same rapist returned to the victim’s home again later in 2008 and raped the initial victim’s daughter.   NCIS and the Norfolk Police Department (NPD) began to work together to try to identify the rapist, and NPD later recovered latent fingerprints from the scene in 2008. Those fingerprints from 2008 matched the fingerprints of Garcia. Garcia was a U.S. Navy reservist at the time of the 2008 rapes and lived approximately one mile from the victims.

Garcia was originally indicted by a federal grand jury on Oct. 9, 2014, and will be sentenced on Feb. 22, 2016. In August 2014, Garcia was convicted of the 2008 rapes in Norfolk Circuit Court and was sentenced to life in prison.

Dana J. Boente, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, made the announcement after the plea was accepted by U.S. District Judge Raymond A. Jackson. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Elizabeth M. Yusi and Benjamin L. Hatch are prosecuting the case.

A copy of this press release may be found on the website of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.  Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia or on PACER by searching for Case No. 2:14cr134.

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