Defendant Prosecuted Under Project Safe Childhood
ALBUQUERQUE - Raylon Castillo, 20, an enrolled member of the Jicarilla Apache Nation who resides in Dulce, N.M., was sentenced this morning for his statutory rape conviction. Castillo was sentenced to serve 30 months in federal prison followed by a five-year term of supervised release. Castillo will be required to register as a sex offender when he completes his prison sentence.
Castillo was arrested on Dec. 18, 2014, on a criminal complaint charging him with sexually assaulting a Native American minor who was between the age of 12 and 16 years on July 25, 2014, on the Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation in Otero County, N.M. Castillo was arrested on tribal charges on July 25, 2014, and remained in tribal custody until his arrest on the federal complaint in Dec. 2014.
Castillo was indicted on May 20, 2015, and charged with sexual abuse of a minor on July 25, 2014, in Otero County. On July 1, 2015, Castillo pled guilty to the indictment. In entering his guilty plea, Castillo admitted engaging in a sexual act with the victim, who was 14 years old and at least four years younger than Castillo. Castillo admitted committing the crime on the Mescalero Apache Reservation.
This case was investigated by the Las Cruces office of the FBI and the Mescalero Agency of the BIA’s Office of Justice Services. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Aaron O. Jordan of the U.S. Attorney’s Las Cruces Branch Office as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and DOJ’s Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit http://www.justice.gov/psc/.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
