When Manuel Santiago pleaded guilty to three counts of fourth-degree sexual assault and three counts of risk of injury to a child in Waterbury Superior Court on Jan. 8, 2025, Denise, his ex-girlfriend and mother to two of his victims, was told he would be released in May 2027. But in December 2025, she discovered that Santiago would instead be getting out in August 2026, because the Waterbury State’s Attorney’s Office and Waterbury Court had agreed to a sentence reduction, without notifying her or the family of Santiago’s other victim.

“We were not notified of an application, of a hearing, we were not given an opportunity to speak, and yet they approved it,” said Denise. “It seemed, in my eyes to be hushed, because how did it go from an application to an approval with no hearing?”

Emails provided to Inside Investigator by a confidential source reveal that Waterbury State’s Attorney Maureen Platt, Waterbury Superior Court Judge Corrine Klatt, and Waterbury Assistant Public Defender Tanisha Williams modified Santiago’s sentence in a manner that would purposefully circumvent notification of the victims’ families.

“I believe we should resolve this thru a Motion to Correct an illegql [sic] sentence,” wrote Platt, in an email sent on Oct. 24, 2025. “Otherwise, we will have to notify the victim again and have a hearing.”

Williams, who served as Santiago’s assigned counsel, first emailed Platt and Klatt on October 23, 2025, to say that modification of Santiago’s sentence was needed to ensure he received credit for the time he had already served while held on bond. Santiago had been detained since his initial arrest on July 21, 2022, due to an inability to pay his bond, which was originally set at $325,000.

Williams said she conferred with the court clerk’s office, who told her the issue could be rectified by “filing a motion to re-open the judgment,” having Santiago’s pleas vacated on one of his three dockets, and repleaded on the other two. At the time of his arrest, Santiago’s charges were originally split amongst two dockets for assaults committed against two separate children, Denise’s youngest daughter and another child from a past relationship. A third docket was opened on March 27, 2024, after another child, Denise’s eldest daughter, came forward with additional accounts of abuse. Per Williams’ first email, Klatt said she “would prefer that this be handled through a Sentence Modification.” If either of the above motions were filed, either to re-open for judgment or for sentence modification, the victims’ families would have been notified, and an additional hearing would have been held before the court. Platt indicated that a Motion to Correct was her preferred option, and Klatt agreed, saying it “would probably be the cleanest way to resolve this.”

“I believe Attorney Platt was concerned that any modification to Mr. Santiago’s sentence would contrast with what she conveyed to the claimants [victims] when she explained the plea deal to them,” wrote Williams. “However, I hope that we can all agree that a modification of his sentence actually effectuates what was originally agreed upon, which was a split sentence with 4 years to serve. Not modifying the sentence, on the other hand, would result in Mr. Santiago serving a period of incarceration of an additional 20 months than what was agreed upon.”

For pleaded cases which result in two or more years of jail time, 54-91C of the state’s General Statutes mandates that the case’s prosecutor must inform victims of, “The maximum period of imprisonment that may apply to the defendant; (2) whether the defendant may be eligible to earn risk reduction credits pursuant to section 18-98e; (3) whether the defendant may be eligible to apply for release on parole pursuant to section 54-125a; and (4) whether the defendant may be eligible for automatic erasure of such defendant’s criminal conviction.”

According to Denise, there was a clear difference between what was communicated to her at the time she agreed to the plea deal and what has transpired since.

“They were pushing for eight years suspended after four, and they were not going to give him time served,” said Denise. “They were going to start the clock ticking from when my second daughter came forward.”

The Motion to Correct, which Judge Klatt accepted on Nov. 12, 2025, credited Santiago for the time served since his initial arrest date in 2022. Denise said that when she and the mother of Santiago’s other victim originally agreed to Santiago’s plea deal, they were told that the earliest date by which he could ask for time-served credits would be from March 2023. Denise said she was “very happy about [him] not getting time served because he didn’t deserve it.” She even said as much in the victim impact statement she gave on the day of Santiago’s sentencing.

“I don’t feel that time served is sufficient,” read Denise’s statement, a copy of which she provided to Inside Investigator. “You are only there because bail could not be made, not because you were sentenced to be.”

In her Motion to Correct, Williams argued that his release date should be moved up to credit the time Santiago had already served, as the Department of Correction had denied him from receiving credit due to its “interpretation of relevant statutes.” She argued that without an adjustment, Santiago would “effectively” serve five years, eight months, and seven days, instead of the four years agreed upon in his plea agreement, and that this sentence would “greatly” impact Santiago’s “parole eligibility date and maximum release date.”

“It was the intent and understanding of the parties and the Court that the jail portion of the sentence would be four years – that is, that the defendant’s period of incarceration would not be extended absent a violation of probation once released,” reads the Motion to Correct. “Defendant submits that, as applied by the department of correction, the sentence does not comport with the plea agreement and/or the intent of the parties and the Court, and that correction of the sentence to conform to the agreement is required by relevant law and by fundamental fairness.”

Denise was not notified when the Motion to Correct was filed or approved, only learning of it after receiving notice that Santiago had filed for conditional release in December 2025. As conditional release can only be applied for within a year of an inmate’s release, Denise said she was initially confused. She asked a Victim Services worker over the phone how he could be moving for conditional release if he was set to be released in May 2027.

“I said, ‘Isn’t that within, like, 12 months of release? He’s not due to get out until May of ’27,'” Denise recalled asking. “She [the Victim Services worker] goes, ‘No, it says, right here, it’s August of ’26.’ I said, ‘Excuse me? How? When, when did that change?'”

Denise believes “they did something shady,” a notion reinforced by the fact that when she looked back at the docket, she says the motion was never included. Denise called the Motion to Correct an “additional slap in the face” to Santiago’s request for conditional release. She initially intended to fight the motion until learning that, because neither she nor the other victim’s mother had been informed of its filing, the 30-day deadline to file a motion against it had passed.

“By the time we got that conditional release paper, the 30 days for that modification had already lapsed, so any opportunity [to fight it] was, like, out the window,” said Denise. “That’s why I’m doing what I’m doing, because this is wrong. This is a crock of shit.”

While she was unable to challenge the Motion to Correct, Denise was able to fight his application for conditional release. She and the other victim’s mother submitted letters in opposition to his application and received notice in January 2026 that he was denied.

“I said in my statement to them — Please don’t let him out,” said Denise. “You already violated my children again by modifying something behind our backs, and we wouldn’t even be talking about condition release. If you hadn’t done that, he wouldn’t be up for it yet.”

Another stipulation of Santiago’s plea agreement, which Denise said is being reneged, are the conditions of Santiago’s release. Denise said that Santiago was originally mandated to undergo sexual abuse counseling upon release, and was told that he would be barred from owning a smartphone or using dating apps, and made to notify his parole officer of any future romantic partners, so that they, in turn, could be informed of Santiago’s history. Denise said that the mother of Santiago’s other victim has since inquired with two separate probation offices about Santiago’s release conditions, and was told that he had none other than what’s provided by ten years probation.

“They said, ‘No, he’s 10 years regular probation, there’s no special anything,'” said Denise. “And she’s like, ‘Are you sure? Because that’s not what the sentencing was. The sentencing was 10 years special probation.'”

Another stipulation laid out during Santiago’s sentencing was that he never contact Denise or her children. In a transcript of the sentencing, included in Williams’ Motion to Correct, presiding Judge Joseph Schwartz expressly stated that a violation of the protective order could constitute a “felony punishable by up to ten years in prison.”

“It’s in effect until April 2nd, 2073, so for your purposes, for the rest of your life, those people do not exist to you,” said Judge Schwartz. “Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Santiago replied.

Despite this understanding, Santiago called Denise from Enfield Correctional Institute in September 2025 to confirm the news that their dog, Allie, had passed away.

“I thought, ‘Wow, you’ve got balls, you got a restraining order,'” said Denise. “We hang up, I am livid.”

Denise said she then notified Waterbury Police of the call, who told her nothing could be done about it. At that point, she said she didn’t know what to do next, so she left a voicemail for Enfield Correctional. She later told an Enfield Victim Services worker over the phone directly, who in turn told Denise that she would permanently block Santiago from calling her again.

“So he didn’t even get a slap on the hand for violating a [protective] order by calling my cell phone,” said Denise.

Despite everything her and her family experienced, Denise said she still doesn’t think she would have taken the case to trial if she could do it over again, for fear that her daughters would be “crucified” on the stand, and for the fear that Santiago may have walked “on a technicality.” She recalls being “angered” by the fact that neither she, nor the other victim’s mother, could ever get a word in with Platt during the two and a half year period the case worked its way through the courts, despite having tried to meet with her “at least a dozen times.”

“I know she had other cases, but at some point, you know, it would have just been nice if she would have just taken five minutes of her life to just introduce herself,” said Denise. “Had Maureen Platt taken the time to actually sit down with those victims, I think everything that would have happened — from him, applying for conditional [release], applying for the modification — all of that would have been done on the record, correctly, because she would have known then that the victims would have a say. But they basically silenced those girls, and they said that your voice doesn’t matter because they did it silently and didn’t give them that opportunity.”

Despite fearing more acutely for her and her daughters’ safety as a result of Santiago’s release being moved up, Denise said she primarily takes issue with the court’s lack of transparency.

“The fact that everything was done on the low, behind our backs, with no knowledge,” said Denise. “I mean, not even that he applied for it, — nothing. I think that that was just — it was a blatant disregard for those three girls’ rights, my daughters and the other girl. They blatantly violated their rights, they didn’t give them the option to speak up, they didn’t allow their voice to matter, and that pisses me off.”

Representatives from the Waterbury’s State’s Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to Inside Investigator’s request for comment.

Republish This Story

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.