A Utah man faces a slew of assault and kidnapping charges after, police said, he held his girlfriend and her family hostage for about six months under the false pretense that members of “the cartel” were after them.
Dominic Garcia, 23, was arrested Saturday and charged with 28 counts, most of them felonies, in connection with the alleged hostage situation involving seven people. He is being held at the Salt Lake County Jail, and it is unclear whether he has an attorney.
“The family has lived in constant fear of Dominic and the people Dominic has lead them to believe were trying to kill them for approximately 6 months,” police said in a probable cause affidavit. “Dominic has had access to handguns and has been threatening to use or have others use those weapons causing death to the family, causing them to believe their [lives were] in danger.”
The affidavit says Greater Salt Lake police officers responded to a home in Millcreek on Saturday after they received a call from someone claiming he and his family had been held against their will by Garcia, their daughter’s boyfriend. The family comprised seven people, including the complainant, identified as “RS,” and Garcia’s girlfriend, who is pregnant.
“The complainant reported they weren’t able to take it any longer, and they were holding Dominic at gunpoint until police arrived,” the affidavit says. “Officers arrived and took Dominic into custody without incident.”
RS told officers that he and his wife had allowed Garcia to move into their home in December because he was dating their daughter, the affidavit says. Almost immediately afterward, Garcia told the family that “his family was part of a business that had ties to the cartel” and that they needed to do certain things and “be diligent in their safety,” it says.
The affidavit says that RS bought a 10 mm handgun, which Garcia began carrying to protect the family, and that he would “rack the gun and take the magazine out in the living room,” making the family feel threatened.
“RS said Dominic repeatedly told them the cartel would kill them if they did not do what they were told,” police said.
The affidavit says that at one point, Garcia told the family that “his grandfather’s business did a bad deal” and that they needed to leave their home for a while.
They left the home for about a month, and when they came back, a member of the family sent a message to a friend explaining that the cartel was trying to kill them, authorities said. When Garcia saw the message, RS told police, “things became very bad,” according to the affidavit.
The family member told police that Garcia pointed the handgun at her and threatened to kill her, telling her that “the men wanted her punished and held accountable” for the message she sent to her friend, the affidavit says.
Garcia also ordered that she do a “boot camp” for around four weeks, which included five workouts per day and ice baths. Garcia also told her to ice her face so she didn’t feel pain because “the men” were going to beat her, and he held her face underwater “until he felt it was sufficient,” the affidavit says. The family member told police she struggled to breathe when Garcia did that.
Other members of the family told police that Garcia would monitor all their movements and prevent them from leaving the house, authorities said. One family member reported having left the house only around three times since the return from the monthlong hideaway, the affidavit says. She also told police that she had to sleep in the living room and stand guard every night until 5:30 a.m. for “people trying to kill them,” it says.
Another family member, who is 17, told police that Garcia’s claims about people trying to kill them resulted in her missing a month of her senior year of high school and leaving her senior dinner early because he insisted that she come home, according to the affidavit.
Garcia’s pregnant girlfriend, identified as KS, said she felt that her boyfriend had threatened her family but never felt he would hurt her, the affidavit says.
“All the family believed they were trying to keep Dominic in line with the cartel or his unknown business and they had to do these things as a condition for his continued membership with the cartel,” the affidavit says.
Questioned by police Saturday, Garcia said that everything he told the family was a lie, including that “his grandfather did business with an organization referred to as the ‘unknown society'” and that members of “the cartel” wanted to kill them, authorities said. The affidavit says he also admitted to holding a boot camp for one of the family members and making her undergo ice baths.
“Dominic said that he continued this lie for several months because he did not know how to stop it in fear that they would not like him,” police said.
Garcia faces seven counts of aggravated assault, seven counts of aggravated kidnapping, seven counts of hazing involving the use of a dangerous weapon and seven counts of threat of violence — the latter of which is a class B misdemeanor.
In arguing for felony charges to be filed, the affidavit says the family “became visibly shaken at the idea that Dominic could be let out and multiple family members began crying and believing there was still a chance the cartel could kill them.”
“Releasing Dominic would not only be a danger to the family but would also be a substantial danger to the community if his claims of being involved in the cartel were valid,” the affidavit says. “Dominic is a flight risk because he has close family down in Mexico.”
