6 days ago
Man sentenced in card theft case
EAU CLAIRE — An Illinois man pleaded no contest Tuesday to a charge of theft of movable property valued between $10,000 and $100,000 in an unusual case.
The property? An extensive set of collectible cards.
Daniel Monarrez, 33, was one of two people charged in the case. The court dismissed the charges against his co-defendant, Rosario Pillado, at the prosecution's request.
Monarrez attended his sentencing by video link from the Racine Correctional Institution. The plea was the result of an agreement between the prosecution and defense, according to court records. Monarrez received an 18-month prison sentence with 18 months' extended supervision, but those were stayed. He will spend two years on probation after completion of his sentence in a Trempealeau County robbery case.
A stayed sentence means the prison term will not be imposed if Monarrez completes probation without further incidents.
The details of the latter case aren't well documented on the state's court database. Monarrez pleaded no contest to robbery with threat of force, theft of movable property and carrying a concealed weapon in 2024. But the online file is vague about what that sentence was. It says only that the state, defense and defendant made statements, then 'Defendant sentenced.'
The Wisconsin Department of Corrections' inmate locator shows a little more, listing Monarrez's maximum discharge date as April 2030. That's six years after the conviction, which means Monarrez received less than the 15-year maximum sentence the charge could have carried.
The case against Monarrez began last year after a woman contacted police to say a set of cards she inherited from her grandfather had been stolen and that she suspected Pillado and Monarrez.
According to the criminal complaint, she sold a similar set of Pokemon cards for $10,000 and bought a car with the money. When Pillado asked how she could afford the cards, she mentioned the sale.
Pillado didn't forget about the comment. He made repeated comments about the woman 'sitting on' a lot of money with the remaining collection. He and Monarrez visited later, and asked multiple times about whether her apartment had video surveillance.
Pillado persuaded the woman to drive him to Arcadia while Monarrez stayed behind to take a shower. Monarrez arrived in Arcadia about 45 minutes later. The woman returned home and found the collection missing, along with an unknown number of baseball cards from her grandfather's collection.
Finding the Pokemon collection required the thief to search. The woman told police she had moved it because she didn't trust the men based on their behavior.
Last month the court heard that a witness needed for the case had stopped communicating and was removed from the planned witness list. That update also included the defense specifically telling the judge negotiations for a settlement were continuing.
