Posted on 09/20/2006 4:27:27 PM PDT by SandRat
BISBEE — A Mexican man pleaded no contest Tuesday to charges he stole a pickup truck and dragged a Sheriff’s deputy during a March traffic stop in Huachuca City, breaking the deputy’s ankle in the process.
Hugo Rodr’guez Pelagio, 24, of Tangancicuaro, Michoacan state, will serve three years in prison and pay up to $200 in restitution as part of a plea agreement with the state. According to an arrest report from the Sheriff’s Department, Rodr’guez Pelagio was stopped at about 2:38 a.m. on March 21 as he was driving with an unidentified passenger along Highway 90 northbound in a Ford F-250 truck.
After a license plate check revealed that the truck had been reported stolen, Sheriff’s Deputy Wyatt Berry approached the vehicle and reached inside to turn it off. As he did, Rodr’guez Pelagio accelerated and dragged Berry about 100 yards.
The vehicle continued another half mile before the two passengers abandoned the truck and fled into the desert. Rodr’guez Pelagio was found hiding in a field a short distance away, but searchers from the Border Patrol and Huachuca City Police Department were unable to locate the passenger.
Indigent Defense Coordinator Mike Politi, who stood in for defense attorney Joel Larson at Tuesday’s hearing, told Superior Court Judge James Conlogue that the defendant could have been sentenced to 11 years in prison if he had been convicted at trial.
Rodr’guez Pelagio will be formally sentenced on Oct. 13 for the no contest convictions on one class 3 felony count of car theft and one Class 5 felony count of injuring a peace officer.
Marc Offenhartz, the prosecutor in the case, said Berry and the owner of the stolen truck were amenable to the plea deal.
HERALD/REVIEW reporter Jonathan Clark can be reached at 515-4693.
Doing Crimes Americans won't do.
I guess the $200 goes to the owner of the truck. What about to us who paid for the broken ankle?
How poor is ol' Hugo?
So poor that he couldn't afford another "i" in his name.
Anyone want to go to Mexico and try the same thing there?
I didn't think so...
ping
Bttt!
A white guy would get 7-10 years. Beam me up, Scotty!
HEY, hey, hey..It's much more important that we arrest and imprison Border Patrol Agents for 20 years for doing their jobs than send illegal aliens to jail for killing, raping and robbing Americans isnt it?
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