BOSTON, Nov. 1, 2016—Nearly two decades after he fled prosecution, a Chelsea man has been found guilty of sexually assaulting a child, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said.
A Suffolk Superior Court jury yesterday convicted MIGUEL RODRIGUEZ (D.O.B. 9/19/62) a.k.a. MIGUEL ANTONIO RODRIGUEZ MONTECINOS of one count of rape of a child and two counts of indecent assault and battery of a child under 14 for assaults that occurred in 1997. He faces sentencing Tuesday.
During a trial that began Oct. 26, Assistant District Attorney Sarah McEvoy of the DA’s Child Protection Unit presented evidence and testimony to prove that in December of 1997, Rodriguez was known to the then 12-year-old victim as a friend of her family. The evidence showed that he took advantage of this position of trust to assault the victim during a sleepover at the Chelsea home of another family acquaintance.
After an investigation by Chelsea Police detectives and Suffolk prosecutors, Rodriguez was indicted in January of 1998 but fled later that year in an attempt to evade prosecution. He was captured 17 years later when he was pulled over by Massachusetts State Police in October 2015. He gave police an ID with the name Antonio Montecinos, but fingerprinting revealed that he was in fact Rodriguez.
“Suffolk prosecutors and victim advocates could not have built this case without the diligent work of Chelsea detectives who investigated it so long ago,” Conley said. “We could not have brought it to court without the State troopers who identified the defendant through his fingerprints. And we could not have held the defendant accountable without the courage of a young survivor who defied her fear and disclosed the abuse. She was and remains at the very heart of our case.”
Tina Nguyen is the DA’s assigned victim-witness advocate. Rodriguez is represented by Jeffrey Rubin and Todd Pomerleau. He faces sentencing Tuesday before Judge Robert Gordon.
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All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
