A man from Vermilion County will spend the next 16 years behind bars after pleading guilty to molesting a young girl two years ago.
State’s Attorney Jacqueline Lacy says 38-year-old Benny Helms pleaded guilty Wednesday afternoon to predatory criminal sexual assault of a child, a class X felony.
Lacy says that Helms moved in with the girl’s mother in November of 2018. She says that the girl reported to her mother soon afterward that Helms had touched her inappropriately.
During the course of the investigation, officers discovered that Helms molested the girl repeatedly over a period of three to four weeks.
Helms will have to serve at least 85 percent of his sentence, or just over 13 and a half years.
