Sex Offender Convicted Of Raping Teen At Gurnee Mills
WAUKEGAN, Ill. (CBS/WBBM) -- A sex offender has been convicted of the rape and abduction of a teenager outside the Gurnee Mills mall last year.
As WBBM Newsradio 780's Nancy Harty reports, a Lake County jury found Richard Gallatin, 38, of Pleasant Prairie, Wis., guilty of forcing his way into the 19-year-old Grayslake woman's vehicle and raping her.
Gallatin was convicted of five counts of aggravated criminal sexual assault, aggravated criminal sexual abuse, aggravated robbery and kidnapping for the June 5 assault.
The jury took two hours to come back with a verdict. Prosecutor Kevin Larue said Gallatin was a dangerous man who now faces a minimum of 30 years and a maximum of 120 years in jail. His sentencing is set for May 19.
"He got out a month before the incident in Wisconsin and took off his leg monitor and came to Illinois," said Larue.
Testifying at his rape trial Wednesday, Gallatin insisted the woman offered him a ride because it was raining, then said the two had consensual sex in her car after they got lost and pulled into a church parking lot.
Jurors were told after Gallatin's testimony that he had pleaded no contest in Wisconsin to a 2003 charge of first-degree attempted sexual assault of a child. Gallatin was released from prison there on May 4 of last year — about a month before he allegedly raped the Grayslake woman.
The victim testified earlier in the trial that she was getting into her car at about 9:15 p.m. during a downpour when Gallatin forced his way into the sedan, holding a plastic bag she believed contained a gun.
Gallatin made her drive to a nearby bank and withdraw $40 from an ATM at the Bank of America branch in Grayslake, prosecutors said, then ordered her to drive to rural Kane County where he raped her in the back seat of her car.
Gallatin was later located on a campground in the Chain O' Lakes State Park in Spring Grove.
"He wasn't officially a guest of the park. He was staying off the beaten path in a wooded area out there," Gurnee Police Cmdr. Jay Patrick said in July of last year. "People were feeling sorry for him as a guy down on his luck and provided him with camping equipment while he was there."
But an anonymous tip led police to the state park, and they apprehended Gallatin.
The Chicago Sun-Times contributed to this report, via the Sun-Times Media Wire
