Sexual Abuse Convict Faces Sex Charges Again

A 65-year-old Austrian national who was convicted last year in absentia for sexually abusing a minor stood trial Monday on new charges of having abused two more 14-year-old boys in his Phnom Penh home, officials said.

Olaf Achleitner was arrested and charged with debauchery in September 2007 for having sexual intercourse with the two teenagers on two separate occasions in his rented home in Daun Penh district’s Phsar Kandal commune. The charges against him were changed Monday to fit the new anti-trafficking law’s Article 42, which punishes sexual intercourse with minors under 15 years of age with five to 10 years in prison.

Municipal court Judge Sin Visal excused all unrelated parties from the courtroom Monday, claiming that the boys would be embarrassed to testify in front of strangers.

Chief of the three-judge panel at Monday’s trial, Ke Sakhorn, said by telephone that the trial was completed Monday, though court officials weren’t sure when they would announce the verdict. He added that the defendant was eligible to receive double sentencing due to the fact that he has been charged on two separate counts.

Noun Phanith, a lawyer at the NGO Action Pour les Enfants, noted that the defendant was convicted in absentia in October for having sexual intercourse with a minor in 2002 but has served none of his 10-year sentence.

Noun Phanith criticized the lighter penalties under the new anti-trafficking law, and said he hoped Achleitner received the maximum punishment for his repeated offenses.

“I don’t like this new law very much,” he said. “It is lighter—only five to 10 years.”

Defense lawyer Dun Vibol said his client understood the previous charges against him had been dropped since he received bail in 2003 and had lived undisturbed in Phnom Penh since that time.

“He understood that the charge was dropped,” said Dun Vibol, who welcomed the decision to charge his client under the new law.

“It is good. I like it. Even if he is guilty, it is less punishment,” he said.

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