DA: Elmford Man Indicted For Violent Sex Assaults In Westchester
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- An Elmford man has been indicted on multiple charges in connection with four violent sexual assaults in Westchester County, prosecutors said Tuesday.
Silvio Raul Illescas was arraigned on 28 charges including predatory sexual assault, attempted murder, rape, unlawful imprisonment, robbery and other charges.
In the first incident, prosecutors said he abducted a woman in the Town of Greenburgh back in August of 2011 as she was walking home from work.
He took the woman to a secluded area near a Home Depot in Yonkers where he choked and sexually assaulted her, according to authorities.
Prosecutors said he met the other three victims in February and March through ads for escorts on the website backpage.com.
In each incident, prosecutors said he would meet the victim at a hotel for sex and would demand they not use a condom, but each time, the victim refused. He would then attack the victims before sexually assaulting them, prosecutors said.
In one incident on Feb. 13, authorities said he punched and choked the victim and threatened her with a gun. Prosecutors said he then stole the victim's three cell phones and told her not to go to the police.
He used one of those stolen phones to contact the next victim he met through backpage.com on Feb. 23, authorities said. In that incident, after the victim refused to have unprotected sex, prosecutors said he stabbed her in the neck, face and chest.
Prosecutors said the fourth attack happened on March 3. Again, he threatened the victim and sexually assaulted her when she refused to have unprotected sex.
"If not for all four of these women immediately crying out, contacting police and helping with the investigation, this serial rapist,
who was becoming increasingly more violent, would still be at large," Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore said.
Illescas in due back in court later this month. If convicted, he faces up to 25 years in prison.
