A school bus driver has been arrested and charged for sexually assaulting a four-year-old girl with special needs, police say.
Denis Alcazar, 34, was arrested on May 2 in Glendale, California, after a months-long investigation into reports of sexual misconduct with the four-year-old and with a different four-year-old five years prior.
A spokesperson for the local police department has said investigators suspect Alcazar’s behavior is a pattern and that more victims will likely be revealed.
School bus driver Denis Alcazar, 34, has been arrested and charged for sexually assaulting a four-year-old girl with special needs, and police say they expect more victims to be revealed
The driver was employed by two bus companies serving schools around the Los Angeles area
The investigation was opened on October 5 after Glendale police received a report of ‘inappropriate contact’ between the alleged victim and her school bus driver.
‘She communicated with her parents the best that she could that something was going on that wasn’t right with a man that she knew,’ Glendale Police Department Sgt. Dan Suttles told KTLA.
The alleged incident took place on a school bus and is being investigated as a possible sexual assault.
After the investigation began Alcazar was implicated in an incident five years ago with another victim in Bell Gardens.
Alcazar allegedly sexually molested his girlfriend’s daughter while he babysat her, police said. The daughter was also four years old at the time.
Police issued a warrant for Alcazar’s arrest one week before he was arrested.
The 34-year-old has pleaded not guilty to one count of continuous sexual abuse of a child under age 14 and one count of false imprisonment by violence, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office told KTLA.
In a news release, investigators revealed they’d discovered ‘other victims from Los Angeles and Bell Gardens’ but did not provide any additional information.
‘I personally don’t believe that this is going to be the first time this individual’s done this,’ Suttles said.
‘If he did it five years ago, and now he’s doing it again, there’s a long span in between. I fear that he’s out there victimizing other children.’
Alcazar had been employed by two companies that send buses to schools throughout the Los Angeles area.
First Student Bus Co is cooperating with police and has removed Alcazar from service.
A spokesperson for Brooks Transportation declined to comment.
Alcazar’s bail was set at $400,000 and he is scheduled to appear in court for a preliminary hearing on June 15.