TRAVEL ALERT

[trilingual]

More on the dangers of traveling abroad in search of sex with minors. This article deals with U.S. law, but similar laws now exist in other countries. The scary part is that the burden of proof is so low, and that people can be arrested only on supposed "intent." How can any defendant ever prove what he did or didn't "intend" when he bought a plane ticket or got on a plane? Even if someone was traveling abroad as a "sex tourist" only for the purpose of having sex legally with adults in countries like Brazil where prostitution is legal, he could be arrested in the U.S. on trumped-up charges and there would be no effective defense, it seems. The anti-sex forces (I think I'm going to christen them the "Augustinians" in honor of their theological champion) are on the march!

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/20/national/20predator.html

[Guest Mikel]

Did not get a direct link to the article.

[trilingual]

Here's the full text. Should have posted it before.

 

Man, 86, Convicted Under New Law Against Americans Who Go Abroad to Molest Minors

 

By NICK MADIGAN

 

 

SANTA ANA, Calif., Nov. 19 - An 86-year-old man was found guilty of six felonies on Friday in the first trial under a federal law passed last year that strengthened the ability to crack down on sexual predators who travel overseas to molest children.

 

 

When federal investigators arrested the man, John W. Seljan, in October 2003, he admitted that he had been taking at least three trips a year to Southeast Asia for 20 years. His main aim, he said, was to "educate" small children, some not yet 10 years old, sexually.

 

 

In a letter to a 9-year-old girl in the Philippines that was found in Mr. Seljan's briefcase when he was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport as he prepared to board a plane for Manila, he wrote, "Honey, I miss our love-making and that's what life is all about."

 

 

On Friday, Mr. Seljan was found guilty in Federal District Court here of six counts related to molesting children, including the rapes of two girls younger than 12, possession of child pornography and attempting to travel overseas with the intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct.

 

 

Mr. Seljan, a former cleaning-products salesman who remained in custody, faces a possible prison sentence of more than 200 years.

 

 

In court, Mr. Seljan sat silently in a wheelchair as Judge Alicemarie H. Stotler, who oversaw the nonjury trial, pronounced him guilty of the six counts and acquitted him of a seventh.

 

 

Mr. Seljan, gray-haired, unshaven and with failing hearing, listened on headphones. He said a few words to his lawyer before a marshal wheeled him out. He is to be sentenced on March 7.

 

 

Asked about an appeal, Mr. Seljan's lawyer, Alan H. Stokke, was not hopeful.

 

 

"If he survives," Mr. Stokke said outside the courtroom. "If you consider that he's 86 years of age."

 

 

Mr. Seljan is "not any harm to anybody," the lawyer said, describing the law that convicted him as overly harsh. Mr. Stokke refused to discuss Mr. Seljan's previous conviction, for first-degree sexual assault of a minor in 1977 in Marathon County, Wis.

 

 

Mr. Seljan was the second person charged under the so-called Protect Act, which was signed into law in April 2003 and which substantially strengthened laws against child-sex tourism by stiffening penalties and by modifying burden-of-proof requirements for prosecutors.

 

 

The first person charged under it was Michael L. Clark, 70, of Seattle, who was arrested in June 2003 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and accused of having sex with two boys, 10 and 13. Investigators said they believed that he might have molested up to 50 children there. Mr. Clark pleaded guilty and was sentenced in June to eight years and one month in prison.

 

 

Ten men have faced prosecution under the Protect Act, including Walter Schirra, 54, son of Walter M. Schirra Jr., the former astronaut, who was arrested on Nov. 6 in San Francisco as he was about to board a flight to Thailand, his second trip there this year, where investigators say they believe he solicited sex with boys. He is to be arraigned on Nov. 29.

 

 

"One of the sad realities of these cases," the United States attorney in Los Angeles, Debra W. Yang, said in a statement Friday, "is that when people go to other countries to prey on poor children they are laboring under the mistaken notion they are outside the reach of the law."

 

 

Under the Protect Act, pedophiles can be prosecuted for merely trying to travel overseas to molest children, if the intent is clear, Richard Y. Lee, the assistant United States attorney who prosecuted Mr. Seljan, said in an interview Friday.

 

 

Mr. Seljan was "an international sex tourist," Mr. Lee said.

 

 

The charges against him involved four girls, 8, 9, 11 and 12.

 

 

In his luggage, Mr. Seljan had $8,000, the prosecutor said, as well as dozens of pornographic photographs of himself with Filipino girls, sex toys and 100 pounds of chocolate and candy.

[Boston Guy]

Frankly, I think any adult who travels to another country to "educate" young kids about sex should be locked up.

 

Just because the kids are outside the US doesn't mean we should care less about their welfare. I'm seriously not hot and bothered about this guy's convictions, even considering my genuine dislike for the Patriot Act and other government intrusions into our lives.

 

BG