BEAUFORT COUNTY, S.C. (WSAV) – A Bluffton man was sentenced to over two decades in prison this week for attempted murder and other crimes.
In 2021, Francisco Cortes, 30, took his girlfriend to a Hilton Head Island apartment for a paid sexual encounter with another man, the 14th Circuit Solicitor's Office said.
Prosecutors said Cortes grew frustrated with how long the encounter was taking and he fired shots through the door of the apartment.
One bullet struck his girlfriend in the arm and another went through the wall to a neighboring apartment and whizzed past a student studying at their desk.
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Cortes was seen on surveillance footage with a gun just before the shootings took place and then fleeing the scene immediately after the incident, according to the solicitor's office.
Cortes was found guilty Wednesday of two charges of attempted murder, assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature, two charges of discharging a firearm into a dwelling and one count of possession of a weapon during commission of a violent crime.
He received a 22-year sentence.
“This defendant has a penchant for violence and a compulsion to control and own everyone around him,” said prosecutor Samantha Molina. “Not only did he endanger his girlfriend, he jeopardized the lives of at least seven other people in the complex that night.”
Cortes has previous convictions in other states for burglary, theft, arson, driving under suspension, possession of marijuana and multiple charges of public disorderly conduct.
He has a pending charge of pointing a firearm at a person, the solicitor's office said.