After watching graphic sex video between ex-San Antonio attorney and client, juror faints

Mark Benavides, a former San Antonio lawyer, appears in the Wilson County Courthouse on Tuesday, March 27, 2018, in Floresville, TX. He is accused of having sex with his clients in exchange for legal services. Mark Benavides, a former San Antonio lawyer, appears in the Wilson County Courthouse on Tuesday, March 27, 2018, in Floresville, TX. He is accused of having sex with his clients in exchange for legal services. Photo: Bob Owen, Staff / San Antonio Express-News Photo: Bob Owen, Staff / San Antonio Express-News Image 1 of / 39 Caption Close After watching graphic sex video between ex-San Antonio attorney and client, juror faints 1 / 39 Back to Gallery

FLORESVILLE — A juror hearing a sex case against a former San Antonio attorney fainted after seeing video of a sexual encounter involving the defendant as his trial opened Tuesday.

Mark Benavides, 48, is charged with continuous trafficking of persons, accused of having sex with clients in prostitution cases in exchange for legal services. Benavides is being tried in Wilson County on a change of venue from Bexar County because of intense media coverage.

A 29-year-old woman who testified for the state that Benavides forced her to have anal sex and recorded the encounters sat with her hands over her face and cried as the jury heard her plead for Benavides to stop. The Express-News generally does not identify victims of sexual assault.

In a video played in court that only the jury could see, the woman could be heard crying, “Mark, it hurts! You’re hurting me. … Don't be so rough,” as Benavides made sexually explicit commands and repeatedly told her, “Come back here,” as the woman sobbed.

The jurors looked so uncomfortable that District Judge Dick Alcala sent them out for a break, and as they exited, a woman on the jury fainted at the door. She later was excused and an alternate was seated.

Under direct questioning by prosecutor Meredith Chacon, the woman told the jury she had sex with Benavides the day he became her court-appointed attorney around July 2014, for her bond.

She said Benavides would pick her up from her home, take her to the River Inn Motel at Guadalupe and South Frio streets downtown, tell her what to do and which sexual positions he wanted, and use a handheld video recorder to capture the encounters from start to finish. At the end, she said, he would ask her to say “bye” to the camera.

The witness pointed out Benavides in court and also identified him in photographs by his tattoos — Asian writings on the back of each forearm and a large image of the scales of justice down the center of his back.

“Sometimes he would ask me my name, how old I was, and ask, ‘What are you going to do?’“ She would reply, “I'm going to (expletive) my lawyer.”

While questioning the woman under cross-examination, defense attorney Monica E. Guerrero tried to suggest that their interactions remained friendly after his initial arrest.

“I started caring for him as a person because I didn’t have anybody at the time. … He said he would help me get my son back,” the woman told the court.

Benavides was arrested in November 2015 and charged with compelling prostitution in cases involving at least nine female clients. Since then, he has been named in multiple-count indictments.

Women who employed him as their lawyer in prostitution cases told police that Benavides coerced them into having sex to help lessen their legal problems or to get their cases dismissed, an arrest warrant affidavit filed before the original indictments states. The women said the alleged encounters took place at his law office, motels, his car and the courthouse, according to the affidavit.

This month, Benavides was indicted again on a charge of continuous trafficking of persons in connection with alleged incidents that involved four women between 2012 and 2015.

The latest indictment is the fifth open case against Benavides. He faces two charges of sexual assault of a child, one charge of sexual assault and two charges of continuous trafficking of persons, according to court records. Each case will be tried separately.

Benavides faces up to 99 years or life in prison. He has applied for probation, according to court records.