A 51-year-old Mexican national who was deported from the United States five times and previously convicted of sexually assaulting a minor in McHenry County was sentenced Tuesday to three years in federal prison for illegally returning to the country. Francisco Hernandez-Ramos had been living in Harvard, Illinois, when authorities found him unlawfully present, capping a years-long cycle of removal and return that ended this week with a federal judge's sentence in Rockford.
Hernandez-Ramos pleaded guilty in June to one count of unlawful re-entry after removal in federal court in Rockford, according to rockfordnewsfirst.com. On Tuesday, Oct. 27, he was formally sentenced to three years in federal prison, the outlet reported. The Justice Department says Hernandez-Ramos had been deported from the United States five times and was in the country illegally when he was arrested.
Accounts of the arrest date differ. shawlocal.com reports that Hernandez-Ramos, a native of Mexico, “was unlawfully present in the United States on Aug. 7, 2021,” while MyStateline identifies the arrest as occurring in Harvard, Illinois, on August 7, without specifying the year. Both accounts agree he was found unlawfully present in Harvard.
A History Tied to a Child Sex Assault Case
Federal prosecutors say Hernandez-Ramos had prior convictions for criminal sexual assault of a minor, attempted possession of child pornography, illegal entry and illegal re-entry, per the same Rockford outlet's reporting. Those convictions trace back to a McHenry County case detailed by lakemchenryscanner.com, which reported that he pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated criminal sexual assault, a Class 1 felony, and one count of attempted possession of child pornography, a Class 3 felony, and was sentenced in 2022 to six years in state prison for sexually assaulting a child over a seven-year span.
The Justice Department's own release states that U.S. District Judge Iain D. Johnston sentenced Hernandez-Ramos to three years in federal prison for illegally re-entering the United States after multiple deportations. The federal case centers solely on the reentry charge, even as his underlying criminal history includes the child sex assault conviction from McHenry County.
What Comes Next
Hernandez-Ramos is expected to face removal proceedings following his prison sentence, according to the Rockford outlet's report.
The three-year sentence stands well above the federal norm for this type of offense. The United States Sentencing Commission reports that the average sentence for individuals sentenced for illegal reentry was 10 months, and that the average illegal reentry defendant had been removed from the United States 3.2 times — both figures far below what Hernandez-Ramos faced and the number of times he had been deported.
Federal prosecutors elsewhere have pursued similar repeat-reentry cases. A Justice Department announcement regarding prosecutions in the Western District of Wisconsin described a separate defendant, Llamas, as having been deported from the United States five times and having four prior criminal convictions for illegal reentry, though that release did not include a comparable sentence.
