Father and Aunt Plead Not Guilty in Fatal Beating of 5-Year-Old Boy

The father and aunt of a 5-year-old boy beaten to death and buried in a shallow grave earlier this month pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges of murder and accessory to murder, authorities said.

Marco Esquivel Barrera, 34, and Maria Ricardo Esquivel, 28, covered their faces as they entered San Fernando Municipal Court.

Barrera is charged with murder, assault on a child under 8 years old causing death, child abuse and corporal injury to a child, and was being held on $1 million bail, said Deputy Dist. Atty. David Mintz. If convicted of all the charges, Barrera could be sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

Esquivel is charged with child abuse and being an accessory to murder and was being held on $500,000 bail. She faces a maximum prison sentence of 10 years and eight months if convicted, Mintz said.

Barrera and Esquivel, who had previously told police their names were Marco Esquivel Barragon and Juana Barrera, respectively, pleaded not guilty through their attorneys, Mintz said.

A preliminary hearing was set for April 13 in San Fernando Municipal Court.

Ernesto Barrera’s body was found March 1 after sheriff’s deputies examined what appeared to be an abandoned car on Lopez Canyon Road in Angeles National Forest. Barrera and one of his twin 14-year-old sons emerged from the bushes on the other side of the road as deputies checked the car.

They then led the deputies about 50 yards into the tall brush to a small clearing where the 18-inch-deep grave had been dug. According to investigators, Ernesto was part of a complex family. His father was a street vendor and had up to 13 children with the dead boy’s mother, Petra Barrera, 35, and with her sister, Esquivel. The children range from 3 weeks to 16 years old.

Petra lived with some of the children in a rented room on Mineola Street in Arleta. Marco and Esquivel and most of the children lived about two miles away in a converted garage on Desmond Street in Pacoima.

Twelve children--six of them Petra’s--are in county custody.