SAN DIEGO -- A former YMCA employee who molested three 7-year-old girls who attended an after-school program he ran at a Chula Vista school was sentenced today to 45 years to life in state prison.

Daniel Meraz, 26, was convicted last July 28 of eight counts of child molestation.

A jury acquitted the defendant of charges involving a fourth kindergarten- age girl, but found true a special allegation that the crimes involved multiple victims.

Superior Court Judge Raymond Edwards Jr. sentenced Meraz after denying his motion for a new trial.

Deputy District Attorney Lucille Weismantel said last summer that the molestations occurred between July 2002 and March 2003 at Arroyo Vista Charter School.

An investigation was launched after one victim told her mother in April 2003 that "Mr. Danny" had touched her inappropriately, the prosecutor said.

During the trial, Weismantel told the jury that Meraz was a "wolf in sheep's clothing" who took advantage of the victims as they sat in his lap during nap time.

Defense attorney Kerry Armstrong said the girls came forward only after gossip spread at the school.

There were too many inconsistencies in the girls' stories for them to be true, Armstrong told the jury