‘I froze. I couldn’t yell.’ Girl describes alleged sexual assault at McHenry man’s trial

A 15-year-old girl said from the witness stand Tuesday that she woke up to a McHenry man holding her down with his hands and body weight and sexually assaulting her during a visit to her mother’s McCullom Lake home last year during St. Patrick’s Day weekend.

“I froze. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t yell,” the girl testified Tuesday during the jury trial for Alexis Javier Mendez, 28. Jurors began deliberations about 4 p.m. Wednesday.

Mendez, who has been in custody since his arrest in April 2024, is charged with criminal sexual assault with force, a Class 1 felony, and aggravated criminal sexual abuse of a person between the ages 13 and 16, according to a criminal complaint and indictment on file in McHenry County court. If convicted on the most serious Class 1 felony, he could face up to 15 years in prison.

As the girl gave details of what she said occurred in her mother’s bed, she spoke quietly, took long pauses and cried. Mendez kept his head down nearly the entire hour she was on the stand appearing to take notes.

The girl testified that when Mendez was finished, he apologized and said it wouldn’t happen again. She said her arms and pelvic area hurt, and that he came back to the room to tell her his Uber had arrived and to “take care.” She said she eventually got up and went to the bathroom and took a shower. She said there was blood in her underwear.

In opening arguments, Assistant State’s Attorney Elizabeth Vonau told jurors the girl “was terrified” and that Mendez “pinned her down” and “overpowered her with his weight.” Vonau said the girl described “feeling like her body was not her own.”

When she got home to her father’s house, she threw the clothes that Mendez had taken off her into the trash, Vonau said.

Authorities said Mendez had been attending a party in the lower level of the house that night. A woman testified that he had gone upstairs three times to where the girl slept. Each time, the woman testified, she called him to come back downstairs and told him the girl was underage and to leave her alone.

The alleged acts occurred during the early hours of March 17, 2024. Two days later, the girl revealed the alleged assault after a friend saw her crying in a bathroom at school; the girl then told a school social worker, a resource officer, a nurse who examined her and then police, according to testimony and authorities.

No DNA or physical evidence was found because she had showered three times before the examination at the hospital, where she declined an internal examination, Vonau said.

She showered three times because “he did this ugly, disgusting thing to [her]. She wanted to get him off of her,” Vonau said.

Mendez’s defense attorney Mary Cole asserted that the girl declined the internal exam because she knew they would not find any evidence of a sexual assault. But Vonau said it was because she had just been traumatized by a sexual assault.

Cole made the point to jurors that there is no DNA, physical evidence or photos that prove Mendez is guilty of sexual assault and that the case is a “he said, she said” situation. Cole also said that though the state’s witnesses, including a school resource officer and the sexual assault nurse examiner would “echo” the girl’s testimony, there were no witnesses or evidence providing actual evidence of guilt.

In opening statements, Cole told jurors that by the end of the trial, their hearts would be “a little bit broken,” but not because Mendez assaulted the girl.

“There were people who were supposed to be there for [her] but they were not,” Cole said.

She claimed the girl made up the story because she was upset that her mother wasn’t around. But her mother, Cole said, went out drinking with friends and never came home. She left her in a house where there were adults having a party. After the alleged assault, Cole said, her mom didn’t answer her phone or call her back when the girl called; her father said he could not pick her up because he was at work.

“That’s a lot,” Cole said in closing arguments, adding the girl made up the story “in a way to get attention from her parents.”

Mendez “is accused of a monstrous crime, but the rules are Alexis is cloaked in innocence,” Cole said. “It is up to the state to prove [his guilt] beyond a reasonable doubt. ... We care about the truth. ... Your job is to weigh the evidence. Find him not guilty.”