A Los Angeles judge has ordered a sentencing date be set for an 81-year-old convicted pedophile who tried to withdraw his guilty plea to having sexual contact with two 12-year-old boys in Southeast Asia, according to documents obtained Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Philip S. Gutierrez rejected efforts by Jack “Dad” Sporich to withdraw his May 2010 plea to traveling overseas for the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with minors.
Sporich, who once lived in Santa Monica, was charged as a result of an effort by federal law enforcement to identify and prosecute “sex tourists” who travel to Cambodia to engage in illicit sex with children.
Authorities said Sporich would drive his motor bike through the resort town of Siem Reap and drop money as a way to lure children.
He apparently moved to the city in 2005, a year after his release from Atascadero State Hospital, a maximum security psychiatric centre for sexually violent predators.
In 1987, Sporich was convicted in Ventura County of lewd acts with a child under 14 years of age and sentenced to 18 years behind bars, according to court papers.
Sporich was arrested by Cambodian authorities after two boys said they had been repeatedly molested by him, according to the plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles.
In summer 2009, Sporich was expelled from Cambodia and brought to Los Angeles to face trial.
Sporich is facing up to 120 years in federal prison, but his plea agreement states that prosecutors will recommend a term of 10 years behind bars and a lifetime period of supervised release.
The document also states that as part of his deal, Sporich will pay up to $30,000 to be deposited in a fund for the education of the boys with whom he had sex.
— City News Serive