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Hearing set for Turlock defendant accused of keeping former girlfriend in dog crate
Guerra Frank
Frank Deodulo Guerra

The Turlock man accused of physically abusing his former girlfriend, including locking her in a dog crate, will be getting a new lawyer and has a preliminary hearing set for next week.

Frank Deodulo Guerra IV, 22, is facing charges of kidnapping, battery with serious bodily injury, and inflicting corporal injury on a spouse or cohabitant.

The charges against Guerra come from allegations made by his former girlfriend that he physically abused her and tortured her by locking her in a dog crate hours at a time while he went to work.

Guerra was taken into custody Feb. 26 by the Turlock Police Department. He has been held at the Stanislaus County Jail without bail.

Guerra was scheduled to have a bail review hearing Friday, but the Stanislaus County Public Defender’s Office had to recuse the office from representing Guerra because of a conflicting case involving one of the witnesses in Guerra’s case. Stanislaus County Superior Court Judge Ricardo Cordova appointed the law firm of Grisez, Orenstein and Hertle to represent Guerra. A bail review hearing has been set for 8:30 a.m. March 8.

Guerra opted to not waive time for his preliminary hearing, so the judge set a hearing date for 9:30 a.m. March 11. Once Guerra meets with his new attorney, he can decide to waive time and the preliminary hearing would be rescheduled.

According to the court documents the alleged abuse took place between Aug. 1, 2015 and Jan. 4, at which time the victim was able to get away. The victim reported the abuse to the Turlock Police Department and later obtained a voicemail from Guerra in which he allegedly implicates himself in the abuse.

The victim accuses Guerra of keeping her in a dog crate for hours at a time while he went off to work, forcing her to urinate in a dog bowl and smearing dog feces on her. She also claims he physically abused her to such a point that it resulted in a “traumatic condition” according to the criminal complaint.

The kidnapping charge against Guerra stems from at least one occasion that he forcibly took her to some other location within Stanislaus County. The district attorney’s office could not elaborate on the incident.