Former Dixon prison guard pleads guilty to aggravated battery of Ogle County deputies

OREGON — A former Dixon correctional officer was sentenced to 30 months’ probation for the aggravated battery of three Ogle County deputies stemming from a July 2023 incident in rural Polo.

Jamin M. Soria, 47, pleaded guilty June 20 and received his sentences through a plea agreement as he appeared in front of Judge John Redington with attorney Eric Arnquist. Assistant State’s Attorney Allison Huntley represented the state.

Soria was sentenced to concurrent sentences of 30 months’ probation for each felony offense and ordered to undergo any mental health treatment as recommended and take all medications as prescribed. He was also sentenced to 128 days in jail, but had already served 64 days, fulfilling that condition.

Five other counts were dismissed as per the plea agreement. Redington noted that Soria had no criminal history.

Soria was charged after three deputies responded at 11:20 a.m. July 22, 2023, to the 2600 block of South Galena Trail Road in rural Polo for a report of an unwanted person, who turned out to be Soria, Ogle County Sheriff Brian VanVickle said in a news release after the incident.

When deputies told Soria he needed to leave or he would be arrested for trespassing, he attacked them, according to the release.

Before being subdued with a stun gun, Soria who had mixed-martial arts training, “repeatedly leg locked, grabbed and wrestled” one deputy, breaking one of the officer’s hands, while shoving and grabbing the other two.

During one pretrial hearing, Soria told the court he was a victim of childhood sex abuse and that he’d developed post-traumatic stress disorder, in part as a result from his job as a guard at the Dixon prison. Before he quit in February 2023, he told the court he was assigned to the prison’s “X House,” which houses inmates with psychiatric disorders.

In those hearings, Arnquist said Soria had “serious mental health issues” and that he had a dissociative break related to his job and had been seeking treatment for his PTSD.