Local News in Brief : 17-Year Term Given in ’84 Rape-Robbery
A 27-year-old Northern California man was sentenced Monday to 17 years in state prison for the February, 1984, armed robbery of Lautrec Restaurant in Woodland Hills and the rape of a waitress.
The man, Rodney Newell of Gilroy, pleaded no contest in November to robbery and rape charges.
Witnesses told police that Newell and two others walked into the restaurant with handguns at closing and took about $5,000 from the safe and from employees’ wallets. The three forced a waitress upstairs and raped her, witnesses said.
The men wore nylon masks during the robbery but each lifted his mask off part of his face during the rape, and the woman was able to identify them, police said.
The other defendants, Antonio Aaron and Ernesto Burke, also from Northern California, were sentenced last year to 20 years and 18 years in prison, respectively.
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