Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday sentenced a 40-year-old Japanese man to seven years in jail for buying sex from a 13-year-old Vietnamese girl in a Daun Penh district brothel last year.
Kato Atsushi was also ordered to pay 400,000 riel, or about $95, in compensation to the girl, presiding Judge Din Sivuthy said.
“Moreover, the court decided to dismiss the defendant from Cambodia when he finishes his term,” Mr Sivuthy said.
Atsushi was arrested on Sept 7 last year after visiting the girl at a rehabilitation center where she was sent following a police raid on the brothel, located in Chaktomuk commune.
During last month’s trial, the victim said she was trafficked from Vietnam and had been working as a prostitute for over a month.
Also yesterday, Preah Sihanouk Provincial Court sentenced two foreigners in separate cases of purchasing sex from child prostitutes.
American Alan Arthur Perry, 57, was sentenced to three years in prison for paying to have sex with four underage boys, presiding judge Plang Samnang said.
Perry was arrested in April after police interviewed the boys, who claimed they had been paid to have sex or engage in sexual activity with the American.
Perry must also pay each victim 1 million riel, or about $236, Mr Samnang said, adding that a second charge of child pornography distribution was dropped due to a lack of evidence.
The boys’ lawyer, Peng Maneth, said that they would consider appealing the decision to drop the second charge.
French national Michel Blanchard, 45, was sentenced to 17 years in prison for purchasing sex from two 16-year-old boys. Blanchard was ordered to pay each boy 3 million riel compensation, or about $709, the victims’ lawyer said.
“It was a good decision because the suspect committed a lot of illegal actions…in Cambodia which are dangerous to children,” she said, adding that the judge had said Blanchard would be deported after serving out his sentence.
