Florida lawyer charged with sexual abuse of children in Cambodia

On Friday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida announced that 40-year-old Rugh James Cline of Tampa, Florida, had been indicted on 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.

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, he 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.

While he was in Cambodia in 2019, Cline was arrested on child sex charges related to accusations that he picked young girls and took them back to his hotel for sexual services.  He was sentenced in a Cambodian courtroom to two and one-half years in a Cambodian prison for paying girls for sex.

Three of those girls told investigators that Cline paid them $120 to have sex with them.  Although he pled not guilty, the Cambodian court ordered him to pay $3,750 in compensation to each of the girls, according to a report from WTSP.

Once Cline has completed his prison sentence in Cambodia, he’ll be deported from there back to the United States to face his child sex charges in Florida. If convicted on all charges here, he could be looking at life behind bars.

(Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida)

~ Posted by Richard Webster, Ace News Today   /   Follow Richard on Facebook and Twitter