Authorities: 7-year-old brutally raped

A local man has been arrested for the alleged kidnapping and sodomizing of an autistic 7-year-old girl. Police are seeking additional potential victims.

Daniel Blas Flores, 27, was arrested after Huntington Beach police responded at 1:37 p.m. Aug. 19 to a call about a possible child molestation at an apartment complex on Sycamore Avenue.

They found the girl at her apartment, and she appeared to have been sexually assaulted.

Detectives interviewed the girl and other witnesses, and determined that she was playing in the complex’s backyard area with her friends when a man took her against her will to his nearby apartment, authorities said.

From there, the man “brutally sodomized and raped” the 7-year-old, authorities said.

When police learned the man was still inside the apartment, they entered it and found Daniel Blas Flores, 27, in the bedroom where the attack allegedly occurred, police said.

Flores was arrested at the scene and booked at Huntington Beach City Jail on several charges related to sexual assault, authorities said.

Detectives determined the man had lived in the apartment with roommates for the past five months. He lived in Los Angeles previously for an unknown length of time.

Detectives are asking anyone who has any information on the incident, as well as other potential victims, to call the Police Department hotline at (714) 375-5066, or Detective Cathy Meza at (714) 536-5970.