Man sentenced to prison for raping girl, 10

ST. GEORGE — Jeremy James Irwin, who pleaded guilty to raping a 10-year-old girl in St. George, has been sentenced to 25 years to life in prison by 5th District Judge Eric Ludlow.

Irwin, 34, encountered the girl last year while she was staying at a hotel with her own father. She had befriended Irwin's' daughter, who was the same age.

Irwin invited both girls to go with him to get something to eat on Sept. 28, 2008. He eventually took the children to a home near Middleton Drive, took the girl into a back room and raped her.

The child's mother had already called police earlier to report her daughter missing. Police said the child managed to call her mother after the attack. The mother arrived and got the 10-year-old, and then heard from her daughter that she had been raped.

Irwin was arrested and booked into the Purgatory Jail with bail set at $500,000.

Irwin originally was charged with two other first-degree degree felonies — sodomy on a child and child kidnapping, as well as second-degree felony sexual abuse of a child. Those charges were dismissed as part of the plea bargain.

— Linda Thomson