US court rules legality of barring child-sex tourism
Americans who travel abroad and engage in paid sex with children can be prosecuted, a court has ruled.
A US Appeals Court in California ruled on whether the US Constitution’s clause permits criminal sanctions against citizens paying for sex abroad.
The specific case involved a 71-year-old man who during a five-year period in Cambodia had sex with up to 50 boys, according to his own admission.
Cambodian police arrested him in Phnom Penh in 2003. Victims said he paid them anywhere from $2 to $5.
The man was extradited to the US and became the first person to be charged under a 2003 federal law that made it easier to prosecute cases of commercial sex with children abroad.
The man pled guilty and was sentenced to prison for 97 months.
But his case went to the US 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled in favor of the law.
There have been at least 15 similar cases since 2003 compared to only two in the prior decade, said a spokeswoman for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Report by David Wilkening
David
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