(JOLIET) A west suburban man who fled to Mexico after being charged with sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl will be spending the next 24 years in prison after he returned to the United States and was arrested.
In 2010, Aaron Rios-Salazar, 61, was charged with sexually assaulting the child after Plainfield police investigated the incident. But while the case was awaiting trial, he “fled to Mexico for several years,” a statement from the Will County state’s attorney’s office said.
But Rios-Salazar returned to the United States in 2014, and was arrested on a warrant charging him with predatory criminal sexual assault of a child, prosecutors said.
In March, he entered a blind plea of guilty to the enhanced Class X felony, and faced up to 60 years in prison. On Tuesday, Circuit Judge Carla Alessio Policandriotes sentenced him to 24 years.
