Cambodia jails American doctor for child sex

PHNOM PENH, Jan 11, 2012 (AFP) - A Cambodian court on Wednesday sentenced an American doctor to 10 years in prison for paying for sex with two underaged boys, officials said.

Phillip Bruce Shepard from Michigan, was arrested in the capital Phnom Penh last July for abusing the brothers aged 12 and 14.

“He was sentenced to 10 years in prison for purchasing child prostitution,” prosecutor Ek Chheng Huot at Phnom Penh Municipal Court told AFP.

US man found guilty of abusing Cambodian boy, sentenced to 4 years in jail

( Heng Sinith / Associated Press ) - American James D’Agostino, center, is escorted by court security personnel at Phnom Penh Municipal Court in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Friday, Nov. 4, 2011. The court has sentenced the American man to four years in prison on charges of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy.

November 4, 2011
By Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — A Cambodian court has sentenced an American man to four years in prison on charges of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy.

Judge Suos Sam Ath of Phnom Penh Municipal Court said James D’Agostino was found guilty Friday of paying for sexual services from a minor. He paid tuition for the boy, who stayed at his home.

US man found guilty of abusing Cambodian boy

Friday, November 04, 2011

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — A Cambodian court has sentenced an American man to four years in prison on charges of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy.

Judge Suos Sam Ath of Phnom Penh Municipal Court said James D'Agostino was found guilty Friday of paying for sexual services from a minor. He paid tuition for the boy, who stayed at his home.

Cambodia jails American paedophile for child sex

20 October, 2011
Sapa-AFP

A Cambodian court on Thursday sentenced an American man to 10 years in prison for paying for sex with a 12-year-old girl and for drug possession.

James Allan Morrow, 46, was also ordered to pay 10 million riel ($2,500) in compensation to the young victim along with a fine of five million riel, Judge Kor Vanndy at Phnom Penh Municipal Court told AFP.

Two Cambodian women were also jailed for two years each for acting as his accomplices.

How a Sex Offender Evaded the System

American Pedophile Slips Through Cracks

July 12, 2011
By DAN HARRIS (@danbharris) 
ABC Nightline (USA)

Jaycee Dugard's horrific story of survival includes the failure of three separate governmental entities to properly supervise Phillip Garrido, the registered sex offender who repeatedly raped Dugard while he held her captive for 18 years.

The United States Parole Commission, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and the local Contra Costa Sheriff's office all allegedly missed opportunities to stop Garrido's unspeakable abuse.

But of the more than 700,000 sex offenders in America right now supposedly under supervision, 100,000 are unaccounted for, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Kent man accused of having sex with Cambodian girls

May 10, 2010
The Seattle Times (Washington State, USA)

Craig Thomas Carr, 59, will appear in U.S. District Court in Seattle on Monday on allegations that he had sex with underage girls in Cambodia.

Carr was arrested by Cambodian National Police on Jan. 22 and was brought back to the U.S. by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on May 6, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. The charges against Carr are detailed in a five-count criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court.

Carr is charged with travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place and sexual exploitation of a child.

According to affidavit in the case, the investigation into Carr began in December 2009 when the Cambodian National Police, acting on information from the French National Police, learned that a taxi driver in Phnom Penh had advertised that he could connect people with child prostitutes. Carr responded to one of the Internet advertisements in November 2009 and the two men exchanged approximately 20 e-mail messages, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

In the e-mails, Carr told the man that he wanted to have sex with girls around the age of 12, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

Carr traveled to Cambodia on Jan. 13, authorities said. The next day, Carr met the taxi driver at his hotel and was driven to a local guest house, where he met an adult female who appeared to be managing a brothel, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Over the next week, Carr had sex with three different female juveniles, authorities said. Carr paid the man about $3,000 when he arrived in Cambodia and had made two additional payments -- of $3,000 and $1,800 -- to the adult female who allegedly operated the brothel, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Carr also paid each young girl $20 to take sexually explicit photographs of them, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

The Cambodian National Police arrested Carr on Jan. 22. The taxi driver, who was not identified by the U.S. Attorney's Office, was also arrested by Cambodian authorities.

Accused Pedophiles Transferred to US

By Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
01 September 2009

Three Americans arrested for pedophilia in Cambodia in 2008 were taken into US custody Monday, arriving in Los Angeles after being held in Phnom Penh, the US Embassy said Tuesday.

All three were arrested by national police in February, having allegedly traveled to Cambodia to procure sex from underage boys and girls, the embassy said.

Ronald Gerard Boyajian, 49, reportedly traveled to Cambodian in September 2008 and allegedly engaged in sexual activity with a 10-year-old girl from Vietnam, at Kilometer 11, an area on the outskirts of the capital frequented by child sex tourists.

Erik Leonardus Peeters, 41, was accused of sexual acts with three underage Cambodian boys.

Jack Louis Sporich, 75, is accused of abusing one underage boy, and, according to affidavits against him, would ride through the streets of Siem Reap on a motorcycle, throwing money to attract children.

The charges against them “clearly demonstrate to the Cambodian people that the United States will not tolerate this type of abuse,” US Ambassador Carol Rodley said.

The cases sent a signal to the victims that the US is committed to justice, and would “act as a powerful deterrent” for would-be pedophiles traveling to Cambodia, she said.

The arrests came from cooperation between the Cambodian government, local organizations and US authorities, in an ongoing operation called Twisted Traveler, the embassy said.

Lt. Gen. Khieu Sopheak, a spokesman for the Ministry of Interior, told VOA Khmer the arrests were a “positive sign” for the reduction of sexual exploitation of children.

“I understand that this is to strengthen the law and is the result of cooperation between the concerned authorities to eliminate this problem,” he said.

Seila Samneang, the country director of Action Pour Les Enfants told VOA Khmer the group was happy “three bad men” had left Cambodia “to face strong condemnation in the United States.”

“We hope these three dangerous men will be strongly controlled in the United States, and we hope they will not have any opportunity to make relations with children abroad,” she said.

Twelve offenders in 30 reported cases of sexual exploitation of children were arrested in 2008, she said, while 40 child victims from ages 8 to 16 had been rescued. This year, 24 offenders have so far been arrested, and some 70 children rescued.

Released Calif. Molester In Cambodian Jail

May 13, 2009
The Post Chronicle (New Jersey, USA)

A man who won a court-ordered release from sex offender treatment in California has been charged in Cambodia with molesting boys.

Jack Louis Sporich, 74, is in custody in Siem Reap, a tourist destination near Angkor Wat, Action Pour Les Enfants-Cambodia told the Sacramento Bee. Seila Samleang, the organization's executive director, says he allegedly enticed four boys to his house.

Samleang told the Bee in a e-mail Sporich could get as many as three years in prison if he is found guilty.

Sporich spent nine years in prison in California for molesting children. On his release, he was committed to Atascadero State Hospital for treatment as a sexual predator.

In 2004, Sporich was released from Atascadero, where he had refused treatment, and moved to Arizona. His sister, June Caine, told the Bee he married a Cambodian waitress after giving her a $100 tip and built a house there.

"I don't want him out anymore," Caine said. "I think he's sick, and he's never going to get well. I don't want this to go on."

US Hari Krishna leader accused of pedophilia in Cambodia

Mar 6, 2008
DPA

Phnom Penh - The president of a Hari Krishna-affiliated aid organization has been arrested in a guesthouse, allegedly in the company of two young girls in a state of undress, an anti-trafficking police chief said Thursday.

US national Thomas Rapanos Wayne, alias Tattva Darshan Das, whose age was not given, president of the non-government organization Bhaktivedanta Eco Village (BEV) Cambodia, was allegedly arrested in a Phnom Penh guesthouse in the company of two girls aged 12 and 16.

The age of consent in Cambodia is 15.

Phnom Penh Municipal anti-trafficking police chief Eim Rathana said Wayne was arrested Wednesday and investigations were continuing.

'The American has denied the charges, and we must continue to investigate,' Rathana said by telephone.

BEV registered in Cambodia as an aid organization focusing on agricultural assistance, education and child care in 2006.

An anti-trafficking group which said it assisted in arresting Wayne, Action Pour Les Enfants (APLE), said by email Thursday that the alleged victims had been cooperating with the investigation.

Rathana said Wayne had yet to be charged Thursday evening.

The relatively obscure branch of his BEV organization in Cambodia claims to assist 'little children and even university students aspiring to learn,' according to its website.

Cambodian authorities have arrested dozens of foreign pedophiles in recent years, often with the help on non-government organizations such as APLE, in an effort to shake off its reputation as a haven for child molesters.