Rockdale Bartender Beating: Joliet Abuser Sentenced To Prison

JOLIET, IL — Will County Circuit Judge Daniel Rippy sentenced 48-year-old Joliet resident Jason Errichetto to 11 years of imprisonment for the Nov. 30, 2017 torture and beating of Errichetto's girlfriend in a secluded industrial yard off Mound Road in Rockdale where she was left for dead.

At Tuesday's sentencing, Errichetto faced a prison term ranging from three to 14 years.

"I think the sentence was fair, and agreed upon by the family members," Rockdale Police Chief Robert Dykstra told Joliet Patch's editor afterward.

Rockdale's chief credited a couple of people who worked at a nearby industrial property for discovering Errichetto's badly beaten girlfriend, back on Nov. 30. 2017. Errichetto had left her on the ground during a cold winter night, and she suffered a head injury, the chief said.

Without the quick action of the citizens who found her, the beating victim probably would not have lived, Rockdale's police chief told Patch on Tuesday.

Dykstra credited the help of the Will-Grundy Major Crimes Task Force with the swift arrest of Errichetto. The Joliet man was captured and arrested within a matter of hours of the attack.

After beating his girlfriend in the village of Rockdale late at night, Errichetto walked home to his house on Madonnna Avenue in Joliet's Marycrest Area after the attack.

Last August, Judge Rippy found Errichetto guilty of eight crimes including aggravated domestic battery, aggravated battery and domestic battery at his bench trial.

The judge found Errichetto not guilty of the most serious offense, attempted murder.

Errichetto had hired the downtown Joliet law firm of Bretz, Flynn & Associates as his representation.

"There was no motive to kill," attorney Chuck Bretz told Joliet Patch last August following his client's bench trial verdict. "He had time to kill her if that was his intent. There was no direct evidence of a violent assault."

Errichetto must serve 85 percent of his 11-year prison sentence, the prosecutor's office said.

He does get good time credit for the three years and three entire months of incarceration that Errichetto has spent inside the Will County Jail, as one of their longest serving inmates.

The Rockdale chief also credited the work of the Will County State's Attorney's Office, particularly Assistant State's Attorney Adam Capelli, in obtaining the convictions and lengthy prison term for Errichetto.

Dykstra told Patch that hopefully once Errichetto is released from prison a few years down the road, with the support of his family, he can live on the straight and narrow path and not go back to prison yet again.

At the time of Errichetto's attack in Rockdale on Nov. 30, 2017, the 44-year-old Joliet man was a convicted felon and two-time convicted domestic abuser.

Joliet Patch previously reported that the victim worked as a bartender in Rockdale at RJ's Place at the time of the incident. She and Errichetto had been dating about three months.