ILLINOIS
CBS Chicago
Mike Krauser
CHICAGO (CBS) – Proposed legislation to close a loophole in the state’s sex offender laws serves as testament to the persistence of a Plainfield woman who would not take no for an answer.
Tina Estopare’s 15-year-old daughter had been molested by a neighbor in December 2011.
“What he did was fondled her, took her hand, and pleasured himself,” she said.
Prosecutors said the best they could get against her daughter’s molester was a misdemeanor battery conviction. Even the judge wondered aloud why it wasn’t a felony case.
“I squealed in court,” Estapore said.
Estopare has said charging her daughter’s abuser only with misdemeanor battery, there was no option to place him on the state’s sex offender database, because the current misdemeanor battery statute does not include a provision for sexually motivated battery.
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