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Jose Juan Godinez-Leal (MUGSHOT: Westwood PD)
NOTE: This amended story, produced from information provided by Molinelli, corrects an earlier version that contained several errors.
Jose Juan Godinez-Leal, 27, is being held on $525,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail, charged with 10 separate counts stemming from yesterday’s horrifying pre-dawn attack.
Godinez-Leal, who once dated the 30-year-old woman, went up the fire escape of a Washington Avenue building next to the one where the victim lives around 2:20 a.m., Westwood Police Chief Frank Regino told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
The 5-foot-4-inch Mexican immigrant then hopped the roof and climbed in through her window, the chief said.
Two of the woman’s children – one 4, the other 12 – were asleep in the same room, a law enforcement source told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
Godinez-Leal “hit her several times during the assault,” Regino said. “She had to be hospitalized.”
As he was breaking in, the woman quickly hit her boyfriend’s number on her cellphone. Godinez-Leal didn’t realize that the other man heard what was happening and headed to the apartment in a taxi cab, the source said.
A passing officer grew suspicious and asked the boyfriend what he was up to.
Soon after, the victim came out.
Moments later,
Godinez-Leal — who lives on 15th Street in Passaic — emerged, and police arrested him.Charges filed by Westwood police and Molinelli’s office following an investigation by his Special Victims Unit include two counts of aggravated sexual assault during a crime, two counts of child endangerment, criminal restraint with the risk of serious injury and aggravated assault, among others.
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