Smithton man sentenced for sexually abusing child. It’s not the first time he’s done it.
A 73-year-old Smithton man has been sentenced to three years in prison for sexually assaulting a minor — 27 years after he was convicted of sexual abuse the first time.
Allan Range pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse of a victim younger than 13 years old earlier this year, St. Clair County Court records indicate. He had originally been charged with three more counts of the same charge more than two years ago.
According to the 2017 charging documents, Range had four sexual encounters with a 10-year-old girl, stemming from early December 2015 to April 2017.
Range was found guilty of criminal sexual assault in November 1992 and again in December 1993. According to court documents, he is still serving probation on both of those charges.
According to a 2002 Belleville News-Democrat story, Range had sexually abused a 6-year-old girl and her 4-year-old sister in the 1980s. He pleaded guilty to the abuse charges and, at the time, was sentenced to 10 weekends in the county jail and four years of probation. He was also ordered to complete a counseling program for child sex offenders.
As of Thursday afternoon, Range was not listed in the Illinois State Police’s Sex Offender Registry.
At Range’s 1993 sentencing hearing, then-Assistant State’s Attorney Len Cleary stated that if he case had gone to trial, the prosecution could prove that after the older child resisted Range following two years of abuse, “... he turned to (the child’s sister) who at that time was 4 years old ... Then, for about seven or eight years, the defendant sexually abused this child in a number of different ways.”
The 2002 story stated that Range was an employee of the City of Belleville’s Street Department while he was a registered sex offender. The department is across the street from Abraham Lincoln elementary and West Junior high schools.
St. Clair County online court records state that Range will serve in the Illinois Department of Corrections until Oct. 10, 2022.
This story was originally published October 17, 2019 at 12:45 PM.
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