Illinois court gives Belizean, Ian Alamilla, 25 years for strangling wife

General — 29 December 2011 — by Adele O. Trapp - [email protected]

Ian Alamilla, 35, a Belizean who has been living in the United States, has been sentenced to 25 years in Illinois prison for the 2010 murder of his estranged wife Tara Alamilla, which occurred last April. Three months ago, in October, Alamilla had made a blind plea of guilty to the charge of murder and he received his sentence on Thursday, December 22, 2011.

In an announcement released soon after, the DuPage County State’s Attorney Robert B. Berlin said that Judge Kathryn Creswell had handed down the sentence to Alamilla on Thursday.

Alamilla had admitted to the authorities that he alone is responsible for Tara’s brutal murder.

His sentence is closer to the minimum sentence for murder than the maximum life sentence. First degree murder carries a minimum sentence of 20 years to life in the Illinois prison; however, the State agreed that in exchange for a guilty plea, Alamilla would get no more than 50 years.

Berlin recounted Thursday that, “On April 10, 2010, Alamilla and his wife got into a verbal altercation at the family’s home. The couple’s children, ages five, six and eleven at the time, were all asleep in their beds. At some point during the argument, the altercation turned physical and ended with Alamilla strangling his wife to death.”

Alamilla reportedly fled the scene, but hours later he turned himself in to Chicago police.

Westmont Police Department found Tara dead in the basement, while the couple’s children—Travis, Leo and Maya—were found still sleeping, unharmed.

”For the next 25 years, Ian Alamilla will wake up every morning in a jail cell knowing he is responsible for the murder of his wife Tara,” Berlin said. “His actions, however, not only forever took their three children’s mother away from them, but also cost the children a father for the next 25 years.”

Joyci and Alan Feldman, the children’s grandparents, are now raising them.

Tara and Ian, a former scuba instructor, met while she was on vacation in Belize. They had been married since 2002. Alamilla, now a US citizen, later moved to the US with her.