Detective – NBC 6 South Florida

A Miami karate instructor arrested for allegedly molesting one of his 9-year-old students is hoping a judge grants him a bond so he could wait for his trial at home.

Darwin DeJesus Rojas-Frias, 58, was a sensai at Showakai Karate-Do USA on Southwest 88th Street. He was arrested in October on a charge of lewd and lascivious molestation of a child under 12.

Rojas-Frias attended a hearing Friday where his attorneys were seeking to have his released on bond.

“Victim had disclosed to her mother the subject who is the trainer or the sansei had made the victim touch his penis under his clothing,” said a police detective during Friday’s Arthur Hearing.

In the court gallery, about a dozen of Rojas-Frias’ former students and family were in court to support their instructor.

On Sept. 29, the girl was having a one-on-one karate session with Rojas-Frias with her mother present, but after the session, the girl told her mother that Rojas-Frias had taken her to a small closet that was out of the view of the mother, an arrest report said.

According to a forensics interviewer who spoke with the child, “he took her to a back room. She went with him to put stuff away. While putting stuff away he grabbed one her hands and with the other hand pulled – she told me and demonstrated – pulled his pants outward and put her hand inside his underwear.”

After the room incident the child told the forensics interviewer the molestation continued.

“The child tells her in a scared way that’s the way the mom described it, he put his hands in his pants, ‘but mommy I promise you I didn’t touch it, I didn’t squeeze,'” added the interviewer.

Rojas-Frias, who has no criminal record, was taken into custody the same day and admitted to taking the girl inside the closet but denied the allegation, the report said.

“Defendant, what he said was he’s very loving, that’s the word he used when I spoke to him. He’s very affectionate with his students. He even, if I recall correctly, said that he would give her kisses on the head,” said a police detective.

Defense attorney Ricardo Hermida said this case is all based on testimony and highlighted how there was no DNA evidence. Hermida also highlighted the little girl’s medical condition, which was not made public due to privacy reasons.

He believes the child’s version of the story evolved the more she talked with people.

Judge Laura Stuzin has not ruled on whether Rojas-Frias will get a bond.