A registered sex offender who broke into a neighbor’s home in Oak Park, where he raped and sodomized a 3-year-old girl, was sentenced Monday to 85 years in state prison.
Francisco Diaz, 47, pleaded guilty last month to four counts of forcible lewd acts on a child, and admitted serious prior felony convictions, according to Deputy District Attorney Claudia Grasso.
Last summer’s attack occurred the morning of Aug. 11 in the 5200 block of Maple Street.
Diaz broke a screen and curtain rod and climbed through a window of the sleeping child’s bedroom. When the toddler woke up and cried while being sexually assaulted, Diaz carried her out through the window and was walking her toward his home when the defendant’s mother saw them and wrapped the child — who was naked from the waist down — in a blanket.
Police were called around 9:45 a.m. and Diaz was arrested.
Grasso said she invited the victim’s father to the sentencing hearing, but he declined, saying, “I cannot be there and see the defendant, because I don’t know if I could control myself.”
The prosecutor said the girl suffers from night terrors and screams the defendant’s name in her sleep.
“Eighty-five years is a gift,” Grasso said. “The fact that he pled to something that doesn’t have life at the end is a gift.”
Even with custody credits, Diaz will not be eligible for parole until the age of 105, she said.
San Diego County Superior Court Judge Polly H. Shamoon called Diaz’s acts “unconscionable.”
“I hope you realize very, very clearly, sir, that what you did is every family’s nightmare,” the judge told the defendant. “Everything that a parent is afraid of, you did to that child.”
According to the Megan’s Law website, which tracks the state’s sex offenders, Diaz has a 2007 conviction for annoying or molesting a child.
