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Canadian sentenced for sex abuse

Other News Materials 15 August 2008 11:21 (UTC +04:00)

Canadian schoolteacher Christopher Neil has been sentenced to three years and three months in jail for abusing a 13-year-old boy in Thailand, BBC reported.

The 32-year-old was also fined 60,000 baht ($1,780). He still faces similar charges, which he denies, relating to the victim's younger brother.

Neil was detained last year after a doctored internet image was unscrambled using digital technology.

Hundreds of photos allegedly showing him abusing Asian boys were uncovered.

Neil received half the sentence he might have faced, because he pleaded guilty to the charges.

But he denies abusing the victim's younger brother, and his trial on that charge is scheduled for October.

Neil, who only said "OK" after the sentence was passed, will not appeal against the sentence imposed on Friday.

Photos were found online in 2004 of a man sexually abusing at least a dozen Vietnamese and Cambodian boys, some as young as six, but the face of the suspect had been digitally obscured by a swirling shape.

After the images were unscrambled and issued to media for broadcast, investigators received hundreds of tips which led to Neil's arrest on 19 October 2007.

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