Aurora sex offender gets 6½ years in prison

A 32-year-old Aurora sex offender has been sentenced to 6½ years in prison after pleading guilty to grooming a minor over several months in 2016.

At the time of his arrest in late August 2016, Fernando Garcia, of the 700 block of Galena Boulevard, was on probation for giving police false address information while registering as a sex offender, according to Kane County court records.

Garcia pleaded this week to felony luring/grooming a child for sexual purposes from May 1, 2016 through Aug. 25, 2016, in exchange for other less severe charges being dismissed by prosecutors.

Judge David Kliment accepted the plea agreement and issued the sentence, which also includes $1,130 in court costs and fines.

According to prosecutors, Garcia tried to have a relationship with a neighbor, who he knew was only 13 or 14 years old.

They exchanged email addresses. He asked her to sneak out in the middle of the night from her house to meet him. They kissed several times at an abandoned house. Emails also showed he asked her to move in with him, asked if she loved him, and asked if she would be his girlfriend, prosecutors said.

Garcia, who is described in court documents as a sexual predator, was arrested in December 2015 and February 2016 and charged with giving Aurora police false information when he registered as a sex offender. He pleaded guilty in March 2016 to one of the offenses and the other offense was dismissed, records show. He received two years of probation on the felony charge. Information about Garcia's previous sex offense conviction was not immediately available.

The felony charge he pleaded guilty to carried a top sentence of seven years in prison.

• Daily Herald staff writer Susan Sarkauskas contributed to this report.