A US doctor serving five years in a US prison for lying on an affidavit to obtain his 14-year-old Cambodian wife a US visa lost his appeal at a US appeals court in Denver, Colorado, Tuesday against having to register as a sex-offender upon his release, according to legal documents.
Alexander Miles, 52, married a 14-year-old Cambodian girl-referred to in the documents only as SK–in Cambodia in 2001, according to Tuesday’s court decision, posted on Leagle.com, a website that makes US primary case law publicly available.
Mr Miles was sentenced to five years in prison in 2009 for representing his 14-year-old wife as 18 years old on her visa application. The judge also ordered that his jail term be followed by three years of supervised release, with sex offender-related conditions. These include banning Mr Miles from associating with children and requiring him to register as a sex offender in any state where he works or lives.
Mr Miles appealed the conditions on the grounds that making a false statement is not a sex crime. He lost the appeal, the documents relate, because the court concluded the false statement to be part of a “broader pattern of criminal conduct.”
As evidence, the document cites e-mail and chat-room logs wherein Mr Miles reportedly wrote he was “planning to come to Cambodia…to scout for 8 year old virgins” and that his “driver found [him] an 11 year old Khmer beauty who is an orphan.”
Mark Wenig, spokesman for the US Embassy, said he could not comment on individual cases, but that: “The US has not and does not tolerate, nor condone its citizens…coming to Cambodia to engage in illegal acts, including child sex tourism.”
He added: “Everyone who seeks a nonimmigrant visa has to be interviewed,” but said security measures prohibited him from describing additional safeguards against fraud.
Interior Ministry spokesman Lieutenant-General Khieu Sopheak said he had “no idea” whether falsified visa documents and supporting identification were a problem in Cambodia. He was too busy to comment further.
