Man gets 7 years for attack

By Erica M. Bush
The Winchester Star

Winchester — A Frederick County man has been given a seven-year prison term for breaking into a residence and assaulting his wife and her boyfriend.

Rigoberto Molina-Diaz, 45, of the 400 block of Valley Mill Road, was sentenced on Friday in Winchester Circuit Court.

Molina-Diaz — a Honduras native who is in the country illegally — pleaded guilty in June to aggravated malicious wounding, breaking and entering with the intent to commit malicious wounding, and domestic assault and battery under the terms of a plea agreement he entered with the Winchester Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office.

The defendant had originally been charged with two counts of attempted first-degree murder, breaking and entering with the intent to commit murder, and aggravated malicious wounding.

The charge of attempted murder of the man Molina-Diaz was facing was dropped under the terms of the plea agreement. The other, against his wife, was amended to domestic assault and battery.

The intent of the breaking and entering charge was also amended from murder to malicious wounding.

On Friday, Judge John E. Wetsel Jr. sentenced Molina-Diaz to 13 years in prison on the charges of aggravated malicious wounding and breaking and entering with the intent to commit malicious wounding. He was also ordered to serve a year in jail for the assault and battery offense.

The judge suspended all but seven years of the sentences, which will run concurrently.

Winchester Commonwealth’s Attorney Alexander R. Iden said in June that Molina-Diaz’s wife was not living with the defendant when he pushed his way through the door of a Braddock Street apartment on Sept. 8 and assaulted the two victims.

The defendant’s wife was getting ready to go to work when Molina-Diaz entered the residence. He assaulted her when he pushed her out of the way before attacking the man.

"His main goal was the boyfriend," Iden said. Molina-Diaz stabbed him in the head and back with a knife.

It’s not clear whether the defendant came to the residence with the weapon, Iden said.

Molina-Diaz’s wife was not stabbed during the incident, but the man suffered a permanent scar to his head.

Iden asked the court on Friday to sentence the defendant to the maximum incarceration time of 12 years the sentencing guidelines called for. He said Molina-Diaz told an investigator after he was arrested that it is permissible in the Honduras to stab people in the back.

"It’s a pretty outrageous offense," Iden said.

Richard C. Morgan Jr., Molina-Diaz’s attorney, said the defense would have disputed the statement the prosecution said the defendant made to the investigator.

Morgan said the defendant has never had any problems with the police and had a relationship with his wife for 21 years.

"Something quite extreme, quite sad, quite unfortunate happened," Morgan said.

Iden said he took exception to Molina-Diaz being described as a decent man, adding that the defendant is in the country illegally.

Molina-Diaz was also ordered on Friday to pay $3,035 in restitution and not to return to the U.S. should he be deported.

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