Texas doctor charged with sexually abusing children for years in Durham
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- Texas doctor Jacob Cuellar arrested for alleged child abuse in Durham from 2001-2008.
- Cuellar faces multiple charges including statutory rape and indecent liberties.
- Past investigations include a 1998 Duke dorm raid and 2022 San Antonio accusations.
A Texas doctor who once saw his Duke University dorm room raided for child sexual abuse material was arrested Monday on charges of repeatedly abusing children in Durham.
Jacob Gonzalez Cuellar, 46, of San Antonio was indicted by a grand jury May 19 on a charge of statutory sex offense with a child 15 years or younger, two charges of taking indecent liberties with children, two charges of statutory sexual offense with a child by an adult and one charge of statutory rape of a child, court documents show.
The alleged abuse took place between Jan. 1, 2001, and Dec. 30, 2008, with at least two victims as young as 6, according to the indictment.
Last year, Cuellar was charged in San Antonio with at least two counts of aggravated sexual assault and one count of indecency with a child, local TV station KSAT reported. The victim reported the abuse to police in 2022, when she was 11 years old, and said it had been going on since at least 2017, according to the station.
At the time, Cuellar had recently resigned from his position as CEO of Laurel Ridge Treatment Center, a behavioral health center in San Antonio offering treatment for children and adults.
Duke dorm room raided; medical license denied
When Cuellar was a sophomore at Duke in September 1998, State Bureau of Investigation agents raided his dorm room “as part of an inquiry into whether he used his personal computer to disseminate child pornography,” The News & Observer reported then. Agents seized his laptop, printer, several computer disks and a sex toy, but it’s unclear if Cuellar ever faced charges.
The state medical board denied Cuellar a North Carolina resident training license in August 2008, citing a July 1999 conviction on a charge of preparation of an obscene photo, according to the board’s website. Online court records don’t show that conviction.
An El Paso, Texas, newspaper report from 2011 states Cuellar ultimately graduated from Duke and went on to earn his doctor of medicine degree from East Carolina University.
Cuellar was arrested Monday and posted $250,000 bail. He’ll be allowed to return to Texas for his pending trial in San Antonio, court records show.
