Written by Kathryn Lyon in "The Wenatchee Report" copyright 1995 Kathryn Lyon
The following are excerpts from interviews and do not include assertions of fact beyond these statements.
Donna Hidalgo's father and stepmother are Harold and Idella Everett, also charged. Detective Perez questioned her at her home at approximately 11:00 a.m. and then accompanied her to the station around 2:00 p.m. where she was questioned until 5:00 p.m. She had nothing to eat.
At her home, Detective Perez said, "I'll tell you right now if you lie to me that's it. I don't want you to say anything else." He then asked, "Did you sexually abuse these children?" Donna said, "No!" Perez then said, "Just shut the fuck up!"
Detective Perez said, "I have a written statement from your mother saying your father molested you from age eleven to fourteen." Donna said this wasn't true. Detective Perez said he knew her father "sexually abused," "molested," raped" her and "used her as a wife." He was "very graphic." He said he "knew" it went on. He said he knew her father would slip into her room at night and "force himself on me." He said, "Isn't this true? Isn't this what you want to tell me?"
Ms. Hidalgo said Detective Perez questioned her over and over and said he had statements from all the children that she·had sexually abused. He told her he "knew" these statements were true. Detective Perez said, "these came from the mouths of children. Are you calling these children liars? Children don't lie.
Ms. Hidalgo responded, "I'm not saying nothing. I know that I've done nothing." Detective Perez repeated, "Are you calling these children liars? I'm the one who has to sit up all night with these children and hold them and rock them at night and tell them that you sick perverted people will never hurt them again." (Note: two of the children Perez alleged to be her victims are in his foster care.)
Detective Perez told Ms. Hidalgo, "If you tell me this it will go a lot easier." Ms. Hidalgo said, "How can I tell you things that haven't happened?" He responded "You're a lying fucking bitch because I know you did." Perez repeated this phrase and called her a bitch several times.
At one point, Donna asked to go to the bathroom. Perez said,·"no." She asked to go several times and he always refused to let her. There was only one door into the bathroom and the room was very narrow with no other way out. She needed to go badly and told him so. Finally, she said she "would have to pee on him." He got angry and when the caseworker came in he let her go to the bathroom. The caseworker stood in the door and watched her and the door was left open while Perez was in the next room.
At the station, Perez told her he knew she was lying and that she was a "sick pervert." He said he didn't care what she said and "if you do not tell me what I'm telling you is true you will go to prison for the rest of your life." He said, "I'll make sure you never see the light of day again."
Detective Perez said she could go home if she would say the things happened. He said she "could be looking at life in prison," otherwise. He said several times she would be in prison for the rest of her life. He said that, "as a newlywed you will have to bust up your marriage because you won't admit to being a sick pervert." Detective Perez told Ms. Hidalgo he would "make sure she would never see her husband again."
At the time her father was arrested, in her presence, Detective Perez called him a "sick perverted bastard." He called her stepmother, in her presence, a "sick perverted bitch, lower than scum on earth."
(Interview: Donna Hidalgo, 7/25/95.)
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