Group home counselor sentenced to eight years for child molestation

A 30-year-old former youth counselor from Mountain View has been sentenced to eight years in prison after pleading no contest to several child molestation charges involving two girls at a group home in Redwood City, San Mateo County prosecutors said Monday.

Francis Caceres, who was sentenced Friday, was arrested in January 2017 after law enforcement became aware of his contact with a 14-year-old girl who was a resident at the Your House South youth group home in Redwood City where Caceres worked.

After Caceres’ arrest, a 13-year-old girl who was also a resident at Your House South came forward to say she was also a victim, prompting prosecutors to file several more charges against him, prosecutors said. The second victim said she was molested in the Your House South recreation room, according to the district attorney’s office. In December, Caceres pleaded no contest to one charge each of child molestation, witness dissuasion and unlawful sexual intercourse with a child in exchange for an eight-year prison sentence. Prosecutors had asked for a nine-year sentence.

In addition to the prison sentence, Caceres was ordered by San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Stephanie Garratt to pay a yet-to-be-determined amount of restitution to the victims.

He will also have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life, stay away from the victims for 10 years and submit to genetic marker testing, prosecutors said.

Caceres’ defense attorney was not immediately available for comment.