Illegal Immigrant Rapist Gets Maximum Sentence From Carlson

JOLIET, IL - Will County Judge Dave Carlson sentenced confessed Joliet rapist Miguel Luna to a maximum prison term of 80 years on Monday afternoon. The criminal defendant was supposed to be deported back to Mexico in 2012, but Luna's removal from Joliet never happened, according to the judge. In 2015 and 2016, Luna raped two women along the I&M Canal Trail near Route 6.

Luna, now 37, will receive good-time credit for the more than two years of incarceration he has spent inside the Will County Jail, since his arrest in May 2016. The judge informed the courtroom that Luna will be obligated to serve 85 percent of his sentence and he will be classified as a sexual predator in the event he manages to be discharged from an Illinois prison someday.

Luna was represented by Joliet criminal defense lawyer Marzell Richardson. "Mr. Richardson," Judge Carlson remarked, "I don't find any mitigating factors. I found nothing mitigating about the defendant's conduct.

"I feel an overwhelming sorrow that our system let the victims down in this case," the judge continued.

At one point, Carlson scolded the defendant by saying, "this begs the question of why were you here to do these things? You should not have been in this country. This is not some sort of political speech."

On Friday, Judge Carlson informed everyone in the courtroom that the pre-sentence investigation prepared for Luna revealed that he used at least three other aliases over the years and that ICE had issued a deportation number for Luna back in March 2012.

According to Monday's court testimony, Luna had several traffic violations including driving without a license These misdemeanor offenses predated the rapes he committed along the I&M Canal trail in 2015 and 2016.

Carlson said he wondered why Luna was never deported from the Joliet area, wondering whether it was because of "misguided political correctness" or "people that don't believe in laws and borders."

"I don't know," the judge told the courtroom. "But it really, really, begs the question."

On Friday afternoon, Judge Carlson delayed imposing Luna's sentence until Monday because he wanted to be sure of the defendant's true identity. At the start of Monday's proceeding, a probation officer explained to the judge how she determined that Luna was his proper name.

Carlson said that Luna's crimes and the details that Luna revealed to the police during his 2016 confession made his crimes some of the "most unspeakable for this room that has heard so much pain, so much hurt, so much loss."

The details of the rapes, including Luna riding his bicycle along the trail, trolling for attractive young women to assault, "are simply horrific," Carlson told the courtroom. "I'm not so sure that these were just individual acts of impulse."

LUNA ADDRESSES COURT

Although Luna had a Spanish-speaking courtroom interpreter sitting next to him at his sentencing order, Luna told Judge Carlson that he preferred to address everyone in English. Luna had written out a long statement that he calmly read on Monday afternoon.

Here are several of Luna's comments that he made to Judge Carlson:

"God bless you, your honor, God bless the victims and I want to say I'm very, very, sorry for the terrible things I've done to you all."

"I know that I had no excuses for my terrible actions."

"I want to open my heart like never before to you and my Lord Jesus ... about what had happened in this incident and my life."

Luna spent several minutes telling the judge that when he was 4 years old, he was allegedly sexually molested and abused by an older brother.

He also told the judge that he had been baptized and born again as a Christian prior to committing the series of rapes in Joliet.

"I feel I am the worst person in the world and I wish I had died before I had victimized" the women. "I am the worst Christian in the church of the Lord.

"My life is in God's hands. I accept the legal consequences of my" actions.

"I thank God that nobody will ever make me lose my faith for my love for my Lord."

Luna also told the judge how he was constantly being tempted by the Devil to act upon his sexual impulses with the attractive women he saw jogging along the I&M Canal trail near Joliet and Rockdale.

Regarding one of his victims, Luna told the judge how she was "wearing those sexy shorts and a bra. When I saw her a lot of sexual thoughts went through my mind." He said that he prayed for 10 to 20 seconds asking God to stop him from acting on his sexual impulses. Then, he decided to ride his bicycle faster and faster, tackling the college student, punching her in the face, before tying her up and sexually assaulting her for an hour in a nearby wooded area off the trail.

"I couldn't stop myself that morning even though I tried with all my heart ... Afterward, I was praying to God for the police to arrest me because I was very, very, repentant. In my heart, when I got arrested, I was very happy."

GLASGOW REACTS

The Will County State's Attorney's Office was pleased that Judge Carlson handed down the maximum possible prison sentence. To put Monday's Luna sentence in perspective, it was more than twice as long as the sentence Will County Judge Carla Alessio Policandriotes imposed last December for Shane Smith a hardened ex-convict, who strangled his own mother at her house on Black Road in October 2013 and then stuffed his mother's body into a black garbage bag and drove over to the Des Plaines River where Smith tossed her body into the dirty canal. For that crime, Judge Policandriotes sentenced Shane Smith to 32 years in prison. Policandriotes retired from Will County's bench this month.

“Miguel Luna repeatedly committed the most vicious sexual assaults against innocent, unsuspecting women in a recreation area that people from throughout the region should be able to enjoy in absolute safety,” State's Attorney James Glasgow said on Monday. “This ruthlessly violent predator terrorized our community and destroyed our sense of safety and security. He will spend the rest of his life behind cold steel prison bars where he will never, ever be able to attack an innocent woman again.”

The State's Attorney's Office also noted that Luna was identified during the investigation of a third sexual assault of another woman that occurred on May 18, 2016. Luna, who knew this woman’s friend, tied up his victim and sexually assaulted her in a secluded area near Brandon Road. The victim’s friend later identified Luna for police. After Luna was identified in connection with this case, DNA testing would conclusively link him to his two other sexual assaults.

The third victim, however, recently died; charges related to her case were dropped in exchange for his guilty plea in the other two cases, Glasgow's office said.

Luna, who had entered the United States illegally, was living in the 1400 block of Winifred Street in Joliet at the time of the offenses.

Glasgow praised the Illinois State Police, the Will County Sheriff’s Detectives, and Will County Sheriff Mike Kelley for their dogged work on this investigation as well as Assistant State’s Attorneys Mary Fillipitch and Kelly Tebo, who secured the guilty plea and sentence.

RELATED STORY: Joliet Rapist Had ICE Deportation Order: Judge

Mugshot of Miguel Luna via Will County Sheriff