Jury convicts Houma man of raping relative under 13 years old

Twelve jurors watched as video footage showed a Houma man admitting to detectives that he raped his relative, saying he wasn't getting enough sex. The jurors convicted him in about an hour.

Kirk Carbajal was convicted May 8 of first-degree rape and aggravated crimes against nature after a three-day trial in Judge Randal Bethancourt's Houma courtroom. First-degree rape carries a life sentence, and post-trial motions are set July 10.

The victim was a child and close relative who lived with Carbajal. It is the Houma Courier's policy not to name the victim of sex crimes.

"Remember, he said, 'I didn't want to go out of my house and cheat on my wife,'" Prosecutor Patti Floyd said in her closing argument. She was reciting Carbajal's words from a recorded interview. "I'm glad he had so much concern for his wife."

Floyd argued to jurors that the evidence showed that the child was raped from 6 years old until at least 14, when the detectives stepped in, but that she only needed to prove one instance to convict.

Detective Lawrence Arceneaux Jr. was the lead investigator who interviewed Carbajal. Video footage of the interview showed what appeared to be a nervous Carbajal talking to detectives just before signing that he understood his rights. He told police he didn't take his mental health medicine that morning, and requested a cigarette at least three times.

Arceneaux told him to let them know if he felt like he needed his medicine at any point, and that they'd ask around for a cigarette once they were done talking. They then discussed the contents of the child's diary, which Arceneaux said detailed the abuse in graphic detail. Carbajal confessed in detail to one instance, and told detectives that he wasn't a rapist, or pedophile, that demons made him do it.

"My wife and I aren't intimate like we're supposed to be," Carbajal told Arceneaux. He then said he wasn't raping the child because he would ask for it.

"I know she's not old enough to consent, but I asked for it and she would say yes," he said.

Defense attorney Michael Billiot said the child and the relative who helped report it were conspiring against Carbajal to gain custody of the child, and that by not giving Carbajal his medicine and offering the cigarette, the confession wasn't credible.

"I submit to you, a person prescribed medicine for a mental health disorder needs it as prescribed by the doctor," Billiot said in his closing argument. The cigarette, he said, coaxed a testimony from his client.

"That might not be an incentive for a person with a college degree, but that might be an incentive for a high school drop out with a mental disorder."

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Billiot argued that none of the witnesses added anything beyond the child's testimony. He asked jurors to consider lesser crime that Carbajal could be charged with if jurors didn't find the evidence to meet the highest burden of proof.

Floyd countered by telling jurors to focus on the evidence. She said Billiot's arguments were just distractions from the truth.

"I said he might bring up a red herring," Floyd began. "I guess I could hook up a 20-pound fish and drag it across the evidence table over there."

This article originally appeared on The Courier: Houma man convicted of raping relative under 13 years old