Charges Dropped After Woman Admits Lying

A Municipal Court judge this week said he had no choice but to dismiss charges against a Glendale man whose live-in girlfriend denied that he had beaten her, causing the death of her 12-week-old fetus.

Daisy Garcia, 22, told Judge James E. Rogan during a preliminary hearing in Glendale on Monday that she lied when she told police that Risen Mercado, 24, had punched her in the abdomen.

Glendale police were called after Garcia told a nurse at St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, where she had gone March 9 complaining of pain and heavy bleeding, that she had been beaten. Doctors were unable to save the fetus.

Authorities said Garcia reported being beaten by Mercado several times in the past month, including a hard punch in the abdomen two days before the miscarriage. However, Garcia said Monday that she made up the story because she was angry at Mercado.

Mercado, a guard at Atlantic Richfield Plaza in downtown Los Angeles, could have faced a penalty of nine years in state prison on assault charges, plus an additional five years for inflicting great bodily injury to a pregnant woman, causing the termination of her pregnancy.