SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A judge has sentenced a Rhode Island man who appeared to fake his death and flee the United States to avoid arrest to at least five years in prison for rape.

The sentence handed down Monday for Nicholas Alahverdian (known as Nicholas Rossi in Utah), 38, was the first of two he faces after being convicted separately in August and September of raping two women in northern Utah in 2008. He is scheduled to be sentenced in November for the second conviction.

District Judge Barry Lawrence sentenced Alahverdian to no less than five years and up to life at the Utah State Correctional Facility to begin immediately. He noted that Utah has “indeterminate sentencing,” meaning the sentence is given in a range of years rather than a fixed number, and the state's Board of Pardons

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