Consul, Wife Target of Sex Complaint

Downey police are investigating whether a high-ranking Guatemalan diplomat based in Los Angeles and his wife lured a woman to their suburban home and tried to coerce her into having sex with them.

Lt. Steve Douglass said authorities received a complaint that Consul General Federico Maffioli and his wife, Elizabeth, sexually assaulted a Guatemalan national who had gone to their house on Gallatin Road to inquire about a visa.

Although officers have a statement from the alleged victim, Douglass said, police did not arrest them while they determine whether Maffioli has diplomatic immunity from criminal prosecution, as he contended when questioned by authorities.

Neither Maffioli nor consulate officials could be reached for comment Saturday.

The Guatemalan national told police she was attempting on Thursday to get travel documents for her daughter when someone at the Guatemalan Consulate in Los Angeles told her to contact the consul general at his home.

Douglass said she drove to Maffioli’s house about 10:30 a.m. Thursday and was invited in by the couple. The woman told police that Maffioli and his wife tried to seduce her repeatedly and held her against her will for more than six hours.

“They gave her some food and drinks,” Douglass said, quoting the woman’s statement. “The wife kept trying to undress her so she could have sex with her husband while the woman took pictures. They never got around to talking about the visa.”

Later, Douglass said, the couple took her into their bedroom, where the husband supposedly made sexual advances and fondled her. They also showed her more sexually explicit pictures as well as pornographic movies.

According to Douglass, the woman said she managed to slip out the front door of Maffioli’s house about 5 p.m. when the husband and wife momentarily left the bedroom. She then ran through the quiet middle-class neighborhood with the consul general’s wife chasing her in a car, Douglass said. The woman finally escaped when she went to a nearby home.

“It does not make sense,” Douglass said. “There are no visa materials at the home. They offered to find her work and a place to live. They give her food and drink. It is like this thing was well rehearsed.”