PROSECUTOR: Man Tried to Take Two Girls

A Temecula man tried to kidnap two girls in one day, a prosecutor argued today.

Clifford Allen Alvarez, 45, first tried to pick up a student, and then student on March 11, 2008, according to Cynthia Brewer of the District Attorney's office.

She made an opening statement to a jury of eight men and seven women today at the in French Valley.

Alvarez drove up to the first victim, a 13-year-old girl, as she walked alone at 3:22 p.m. on Temeku Drive, Brewer told the jury. "The defendant started asking for directions to streets," the victim said from the witness stand today.

Patch does not name victims of this type of crime.

The girl told him several times she did not know where the streets are, but he persisted to ask for directions, driving slowly alongside her. "He didn't go away. He persisted and persisted," Brewer said.

The defendant got frustrated and ordered the child into the van with a threat, according to the victim. "He said, 'You need to get in my car. If you run, I will shoot you,'" the now 17-year-old victim said.

She got scared and started stammering, and Alvarez changed his tone, the victim said. "He said, 'Look, if you get in my car, you'll be fine. Just get in my car, and I won't hurt you.'"

The man then turned and began fishing around in a pocket in his door, so she threw down her backpack and darted into the side gate of a nearby house in the 41000 block of Temeku Drive. From behind the fence, she saw the van turn around and speed off,  the girl testified.

When sheriff's deputies arrived, she refused to come out of the backyard. "My mind's always been, 'It's not really them (deputies),'" she said. "I was absolutely terrified."

Alvarez drove about a mile and a half away about 20 minutes later and found the second victim walking with three other children near . They were on their way to a spot where the victim's father was planning to pick them up, and two of the children were tossing small berries at each other, the prosecutor told the jury.

Alvarez pulled up and accused the children of throwing rocks at his van. "He says to (the victim), who's throwing rocks? A child has a bloody eye, and an ambulance has been called," the prosecutor told the jury.

The girl insisted they knew nothing about that, and Alvarez drove away. He came back moments later and told the girl, then 11 years old, to get into his van, the now-15-year-old girl testified today. "He told us to stop throwing rocks," she said. "He told me to get into his car so he could take me to my dad."

The child's father walked up at that point and told one of the children to get into his car and write down the van's license plate number on an envelope. The father told Alvarez to leave the children alone and file a report with the school, the girl said.

The father then gave the license number to a deputy who checked DMV records and found Alvarez was the owner.

An investigator went to Alvarez's home and found the van in the driveway. It matched a description given by the victims -- a white van with a child's car seat in the back and a red Hawaiian lei hanging from the mirror, Brewer said. The prosecutor showed photos to the jury of the vehicle with a car seat and a lei inside.

Deputies picked up the victims separately and drove them by the suspect's house. Alvarez was standing in front, and the victims identified him as the man who tried to pick them up, the two girls testified.

Alvarez was arrested a short time later.