WASHINGTON
Skagit Valley Herald
By MARTA MURVOSH Staff Writer
A Skagit County judge, facing a courtroom full of about 50 family members and supporters of a pastor convicted of molesting two young girls, said he had to consider accounts of the defendant's good works in handing down a sentence.
With that, Judge Michael Rickert Friday sentenced Armando Villalobos-Perez to 4 1/4 years in prison, the shortest sentence he could have meted out under state law.
Sixteen people speaking at Villalobos-Perez's sentencing told the judge they believed the defendant to be innocent.
A jury Oct. 4 found Villalobos-Perez, 58, guilty of three counts of first-degree child molestation. The two victims were clients of his wife's day care. ...
Villalobos-Perez is the pastor of the Iglesia Santa Pentescostes Ovejas De Jesucristo, a Spanish and English Pentecostal church in Mount Vernon.