![\"Kenneth](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775094957_345_OE6GBD7OLBHZLEI447VVHPHBUY.jpg\")
Kenneth Galvez(Photo Credit: Tommy Witherspoon for KWTX)<\/p>\nWACO, Texas (KWTX) – A West man charged with sexually abusing a family member for more than six years testified Wednesday he will always love her despite the false allegations she leveled against him. <\/p>\n
Kenneth Austin Galvez, 46, is on trial in Waco\u2019s 474th State District Court on a continuous sexual assault of a young child charge and four counts of indecency with a child by contact.<\/p>\n
Galvez, a 20-year Tractor Supply Co. employee, denied that he ever touched the girl improperly. He declined to call her a liar or to speculate what might have motivated her to make up the accusations against him or to stick by her allegations for the six years the charges have been pending.<\/p>\n
Kenneth Galvez(Photo Credit: Tommy Witherspoon for KWTX)<\/p>\n
Galvez\u2019s wife, the girl\u2019s mother, testified Wednesday that she thinks her daughter made up the allegations because she and Galvez took her phone away from her in 2020 after they caught her sending inappropriate photos to a man she met online. <\/p>\n
His wife said she initially supported her daughter and kicked Galvez out of their home on Wiggins Road in West after the girl told her therapist that Galvez sexually abused her for at least six years beginning when she was about 7 years old.<\/p>\n
The woman, who is now 23, testified Tuesday and did not waver in her allegations against Galvez, giving specific details about what she described as years on abuse. <\/p>\n
However, his wife said after the girl moved in with her older sister and Galvez was cleared by Child Protective Services workers to return home, she caught her daughter in a series of unrelated lies and was convinced she wrongfully accused Galvez. She allowed him to move back into the home, where he continued to help raise her four other children from a previous marriage and their two sons together.<\/p>\n
Williamson County prosecutors Ryan Bownds and James Murphy and defense attorney Darren Obenoskey rested their cases Wednesday and will give jury summations when the trial enters its fourth day Thursday.<\/p>\n
The Williamson County District Attorney\u2019s Office agreed to prosecute the case after McLennan County District Attorney Josh Tetens recused his office because Tetens represented Galvez in the case before Tetens was elected.<\/p>\n
Galvez, whose father was a pastor, said he and his wife tried to raise their blended families as Christians and said they had an idyllic life in rural McLennan County until the girl\u2019s allegations turned their life upside down.<\/p>\n
He said the girl asked him to adopt her after she convinced her biological father to relinquish his parental rights in December 2019 and also asked him to baptize her a few months later.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was elated to do that,\u201d Galvez said.<\/p>\n
Then he was blindsided a few months after that when the girl made the allegations during a visit to a therapist her mother sent her to after they found the improper photos the girl sent to a stranger she met online.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was absolutely shocked,\u201d he said. \u201cThis all came out of nowhere. I was numb, I was shocked, I couldn\u2019t believe what was being said, and I very quickly packed up my car and left.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said he moved in with his wife\u2019s parents for about a month until he went back home. The girl moved in with her older sister for a time, which her mother said apparently was her goal.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe got what she wanted,\u201d her mother told the jury. \u201cShe got out of the house and she wanted us to stop telling her what to do. She was mad we took away here phone.\u201d<\/p>\n
During cross-examination, Bownds asked Galvez if, as a man of faith, if he is familiar with Matthew 18:6, which says, \u201cIf anyone causes one of these little ones\u2014those who believe in me\u2014to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.\u201d<\/p>\n
Galvez said that while he could not recite it from memory, he agrees with the message.<\/p>\n
The girl testified Tuesday that Galvez often gave her his phone so she could play a puzzle game while he was sexually abusing her. She told jurors the game served as a \u201creally great distraction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Galvez denied he had such an app on his phone, prompting Bownds to ask if he was calling her a liar.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not here to call her a liar,\u201d Galvez said. \u201cI\u2019m just here to tell the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bownds asked how she came up with such specific examples of how he abused her and how her story remained consistent throughout interviews with her counselor, a forensic interviewer, with Dr. Soo Battle, a child sexual abuse examiner, and if front of the jury if the allegations are not true.<\/p>\n
Bownds charged that if she were making up the allegations, she could have cited examples of sexual assault far worse than him improperly touching her.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t speak to her reasons why, her motives or thought processes,\u201d Galvez said. \u201c\u2026I love her no matter what. There is no condition where I would not love her.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other defense testimony Wednesday, three of the woman\u2019s siblings, a cousin, and two family friends all sang Galvez\u2019s praises as a father and caregiver, adding that they never saw or heard anything that seemed suspicious about his relationship with the woman. <\/p>\n
If convicted on the continuous count, Galvez faces a minimum of 25 years in prison with no possibility of parole and up to life in prison with no parole.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 KWTX. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WACO, Texas (KWTX) – A West man charged with sexually abusing a family member for more than six…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":230021,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[89391,89392,89389,89393,27,29,28,89390],"class_list":{"0":"post-231134","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-child-sex-assault","9":"tag-crimes-against-children-in-texas","10":"tag-kenneth-austin-galvez","11":"tag-sex-crimes-in-central-texas","12":"tag-texas","13":"tag-texas-headlines","14":"tag-texas-news","15":"tag-trial-in-wacos-474th-state-district-court"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}