A Silver Spring man pled guilty in Montgomery County Circuit Court late last month to a third-degree sexual offense charge for an incident involving an eleven-year-old girl from Long Branch last winter. Twenty-one-year-old Marcos Torres-Enriquez will be sentenced to five years in prison as the "least involved" of three men accused of crimes of a sexual nature against the child.
Torres-Enriquez's Maryland criminal attorney said the charges were punishable by up to ten years in prison, and that DNA evidence was only found against the other two men. He explained:
"[Law enforcement officials] did recover DNA with regards to the other two co-defendants, both in regards to DNA found on their person and in used condoms found at the scene, but there was no DNA found for Torres-Enriquez... His was the weakest case by far."
One of the other men charged in the case, thirty-one-year-old Melquicideck H. Sorto, pled guilty to rape back on September 13th of this year. Sorto was sentenced November 10th to ten years in prison, but a motion was filed on his behalf requesting Circuit Court Judge Eric M. Johnson reconsider the sentence.
A third man, thirty-nine-year-old Rogelio Mondragon, is currently being evaluated for mental fitness to stand trial. Court documents in the case indicate that Sorto and Mondragon encountered the victim at a gas station. The child first evaded the men, but later was found again by the pair at a park. She followed the men back to their apartment, where documents indicate Sorto and Mondragon raped her. Torres-Enriquez later returned home, encountering the victim and fondled but did not rape her.
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has indicated that Torres-Enriquez is likely to be deported after his sentence is served, and that detainers have been placed on all three men. He is set to be sentenced in February of 2011 in Montgomery County Circuit Court.
This article is presented by Price Benowitz LLP, serving Virginia, Maryland and Washington DC. For more information, please visit our Virginia Criminal Lawyers and Washington DC Criminal Lawyer websites. You can also visit ourMaryland personal injury website.
