PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) -- Saying she is ready for atonement, a Galesburg woman tearfully accepted responsibility for her role in a home invasion last year.

Rebecka M. Castaneda Valadez, 34, hoped that her efforts to rehabilitate herself and her remorse could get her a lesser sentence, all the while, still meting out justice for the victim, a former friend.

But in the end, the judge sided with prosecutors and handed down the maximum sentence under a plea agreement reached this summer with prosecutors.

Castaneda Valadez cried as she hugged two of her five children. And then she walked back into the holding cells. She had wanted to be there for her children, as she admitted she had not been in the past.

Castaneda Valadez pleaded this summer in Peoria County Circuit Court to one count of home

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