Marseilles man charged with child sexual abuse, creating child sexual abuse images gets pretrial release

A Marseilles man facing up to 90 years if convicted of sexually abusing minors and creating sexual abuse images was granted pretrial release Thursday.

Nathaniel R. Haff-Fluech, 21, appeared in La Salle County Circuit Court on Thursday, a day after he was arrested on a warrant charging him with seven felonies. These include four counts of sexual abuse and possession of child sexual abuse images. Three additional counts allege he manufactured child sexual abuse images.

Haff-Fluech’s charges are led by three Class X felonies (which carry prison sentences of six to 30 years) that would have to be served back-to-back for an aggregate term of 18 to 90 years.

Despite that, Haff-Fluech will await trial out of custody. Chief Judge H. Chris Ryan Jr. denied the prosecutors’ motion to detain him. Ryan cited Haff-Fluech’s lack of criminal history and his low score on a risk assessment.

Haff-Fluech is instead subject to home confinement, a no-contact order with the victims and a term of release that keeps him from the internet and smart devices. He will next appear March 22 for arraignment.

Prosecutor Greg Sticka argued for jail, saying investigators seized child sexual abuse images in a Feb. 14 search warrant of Haff-Fluech’s residence.

Sticka described the digital images and videos as “homemade” and said Haff-Fluech admitted to producing the images while the underage victims slept.

In response, Public Defender Ryan Hamer said Haff-Fluech did not flee after the search warrant, undercutting any argument he poses a flight risk, and was a good candidate for electronic monitoring given his clean record and low risk assessment.

Hamer also pointed out five of the seven counts are not recent. La Salle County court records show most charges, including those for sexual contact, are alleged to have occurred in 2019 and 2020.

“The more serious charges are quite remote in time,” Hamer said.