U.S. man in Cambodia won't face sex crime charge

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - An American citizen who resettled to Cambodia and then paid for sex with boys cannot be charged under a U.S. sex tourism law, a U.S. appeals court ruled on Thursday.

Gary Jackson, a retired carpenter, moved to the Southeast Asian country in 2002 after selling his U.S. home and possessions. He was charged in 2003 with giving oral sex to three boys aged 10 to 15 for $21 and was indicted in the United States under a law passed that year aimed at curtailing Americans from traveling abroad for illicit sex.

After admitting he had engaged in sex with the boys, Jackson said he should not face charges under the law and on Thursday the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.

"Gary Jackson admits to committing despicable sexual acts with children -- acts that led to Jackson's arrest by the Cambodian police," Marsha Berzon wrote for a three-judge panel. "Yet his abhorrent conduct does not give us license to ignore the elements of the criminal statutes that Congress has established."

The court ruled that the indictment should be dismissed because Jackson had completed his travels and settled in Cambodia before the law was passed in 2003.