TAMPA, Fla.- Rugh James Cline, 40, Tampa, has been charged with five counts of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place and one count of possessing child exploitation materials.
If convicted, Cline faces a maximum penalty of 30 years in federal prison for each count of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place and up to 20 years’ imprisonment for possessing child pornography.
Cline will be deported to the United States after he completes serving his prison sentence in Cambodia on local charges.
According to the indictment, in February 2019 and May 2019, Cline, a United States citizen and Florida-licensed attorney, traveled to Cambodia. While in Cambodia, Cline paid to sexually abuse four different minors.
The indictment also charges Cline with traveling to Cambodia while possessing materials depicting the sexual abuse of children.
One of the mothers of the abused girl’s, Ms Em, 35, of Cambodia told the Khmer Times that her 15-year-old daughter said she and her sister had gone to Pub Street and met a man from the US, who gave them and some other girls money before taking them back to his home, where he had alleged to have sexually abused them.
“One of my daughters first filed a complaint to the provincial police,” Ms Em says.
She told the local media outlet that after her daughter filed the complaint, police found that there were four children who were sexually abused by the same US man, including her second daughter, who police helped to file another complaint.
This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, with assistance from the U.S. Department of State and the Cambodian National Police. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Frank Murray.