A suspect arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl at a dollar store in unincorporated Alameda County on Sunday is a high-risk sex offender who had recently been released from prison after serving time for a similar offense, sheriff’s officials said Thursday.
Carlyle Villazon, 33, was arrested in Union City at 3:11 p.m. on Wednesday in connection with the incident at the 99 Cents Only store at 2088 Mission Boulevard in Cherryland, an unincorporated community between San Leandro and Hayward.
Alameda County sheriff’s Sgt. Ray Kelly said authorities were able to track down Villazon and link him to the alleged sexual assault because he was wearing a monitoring device on his ankle due to his status as a high-risk sex offender.
Kelly said Villazon was recently released from state prison after serving time for his conviction for sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl Walmart store at 1919 Davis St. in San Leandro on Dec. 10, 2010.
Authorities said that in the incident at the 99 Cents Only store in Cherryland on Sunday the girl was in the toy aisle around 1:45 p.m. when the suspect grabbed her and put his hand in her pants. The suspect then ran from the store, they said.
The girl and her mother waited at the store until sheriff’s investigators arrived and then described the assault, authorities said. Kelly said sheriff’s investigators will present the case to the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office for charging on Friday morning and Villazon may be arraigned later in the day.
Kelly said:
“We will be asking for a maximum sentence.”
San Leandro police said that in the 2010 incident the 8-year-old victim was shopping with her family when she told her mother that her younger brother had disappeared and that she would go find him. A short time later, the girl walked back to her mother in tears and told her that a man had touched her inappropriately.
The girl stuck her hand down her pants to demonstrate what the man had done to her, police said. The victim’s mother immediately told Walmart staff of the incident and she and store employees parties began searching for the suspect inside the store.
Police said Villazon ultimately was chased down by two good Samaritans at the store who pinned him down to the ground until officers arrived and arrested him.
San Leandro police said at that time that Villazon wasn’t a registered sex offender but he had a prior arrest history for traffic violations and making terrorist threats.
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