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Thursday, April 18, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

Sex Perv Gets 210 Years in Lockup

LOS ANGELES (CN) - A retired Marine Corps captain who was convicted of drugging and sexually abusing girls in Cambodia was sentenced Friday to 210 years in federal prison.

A jury in May 2008 convicted Michael Joseph Pepe, 60, of Oxnard, of seven felony counts for traveling to Cambodia to engage in illicit sexual conduct with minors.

In sentencing Pepe, and ordering him to pay $247,000 in restitution to his victims.

U.S. District Judge Dale Fischer said Pepe has shown no remorse for his crimes.

"Monstrous does not begin to capture the horror of the crime or the impact on the victims," Judge Fischer said at the sentencing.

Six girls who were from 9 to 13 years old when Pepe abused them testified at trial that Pepe drugged, bound, beat and raped them. Several said Pepe demanded daily blow jobs.

The U.S. Attorney's Office announced the sentence in a revolting statement that included the sentence: "In addition to the victims' testimony, prosecutors presented corroborating evidence seized by the Cambodian National Police from Pepe's Phnom Penh residence, including rope and cloth strips used to restrain the victims, Rohypnol and other sedatives, and homemade child pornography."

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