New Mexico State Police investigators charged an Albuquerque man with fourth-degree rape for having sex, over an estimated 100 times, with a 13-year-old girl.
State Police Agent Mario Villanueva charged Jason Bottoms, 22, with one count of fourth-degree rape, because the victim, 13 to 14 years at the time of the alleged sexual relationship, was too young to consent to sex with someone four or more years older than her.
Villanueva wrote in a statement of probable cause to summons Bottoms into court, that the girl submitted to a forensic interview in February, where she talked about her relationship with Bottoms, between June 2021 and March 2022. She would have been 13 to 14 at the time, while Bottoms would have been 18- to 19-years-old — a five-year age difference.
The case came to his attention after someone with the Children Youth and Families Department reported it. The victim is now 17.
Rio Arriba Magistrate Judge Alexandra Naranjo arraigned Bottoms on March 24 and released him on his personal recognizance. He is due back in court on April 23 for a status conference.
Allegations
In the forensic interview in March 2024, the girl said she was in a “weird” relationship with Bottoms and that she met him through her brother’s girlfriend, Ruby Hernandez. Bottoms told her the night they met that she looked so young and she told him she was 13, Villanueva wrote.
She said it was easy to meet up with him because she would tell her mother she was going to Hernandez’s house with her brother and she would leave Bottoms and her alone together or Bottoms would pick her up after she snuck out of her house, he wrote.
The pair would write to each other on Facebook messenger and send pictures back and forth. Villanueva eventually searched her phone with her consent and found all the photos and videos, including what appears to be child pornography the victim created and sent to Bottoms.
“Through the course of their relationship, (the victim) said that they had sex over one hundred times,” Villanueva wrote. “(The victim) stated that her and Jason had sex at numerous locations to include Jason’s mothers (sic) house in Chimayo, NM, Ruby’s then residence near Hernandez, NM, secluded mountain areas such as a location known as ‘Prairie’ near Alcalde, NM, and various parking lots,” Villanueva wrote.
The victim told the interviewer that Bottoms was ashamed of them being seen together, told her not to tell anyone about him and that one time he picked her up from middle school, Villanueva wrote.
Bottoms has no prior non-traffic criminal record in New Mexico.