An Effingham man has been sentenced to 30-years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl. Officials say the state could have gotten a sentence of 60 years if the case had gone to trial. However, prosecutors didn’t want to expose the girl, now 9, to the difficulty of a trial. With 27-year-old Aaron Wilkey’s guilty plea, the sentence was capped at 30-years.
