Authorities seek additional victims of former teacher facing new charge of lewd acts with child

LOS ANGELES (FOX 11) - Authorities Wednesday were seeking additional victims of a former teacher serving a five-year prison term for inappropriately touching five young girls at a Rowland Heights elementary school after a new victim came forward, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

Jose Cruz Martinez, 55, is set to be arraigned July 8 at the Pomona courthouse on two counts of committing a lewd act on a child involving alleged crimes that occurred between January and December 2010, according to Ricardo Santiago of the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.

The latest charges involve a now 16-year-old girl who informed Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies in April about the alleged crimes involving Martinez, who was her first-grade teacher at Rorimer Elementary School in La Puente, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

The former Rowland Heights resident was sentenced March 21 to five years in prison after pleading no contest to four felony counts of committing a lewd act on a child and one misdemeanor count of child molesting. He was also ordered to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life. Those charges involved five girls who were inappropriately touched on the campus of Rowland Elementary School between August 2017 and April 2018 while Martinez worked as a second-grade teacher there, according to the District Attorney's Office.

He was arrested in April 2018 by the sheriff's Special Victims Bureau and has remained behind bars since then.

The sheriff's department urged other possible victims to contact the Special Victims Bureau at 877-710-5273 or by e-mail at specialvictimsbureau@lasd.org.

CNS contributed to this report.