Tacoma – A former Workers Sergeant stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM) was sentenced right now in U.S. District Courtroom in Tacoma to 22 years in jail for intercourse trafficking youngsters, producing photos of kid sexual abuse, and touring to sexually abuse youngsters. Moeun Yoeun, 40, of Steilacoom, Washington, pleaded responsible in August 2022, admitting that younger ladies within the Philippines had been threatened with dying in the event that they refused his sexual assaults. On the sentencing listening to U.S. District Decide Benjamin H. Settle referred to as the crimes “vicious, heinous, and merciless.”
“Mr. Yoeun weaponized his place of belief as a noncommissioned officer in the USA Military, to sexually exploit and trigger irreversible trauma to impoverished ladies within the Philippines,” mentioned U.S. Lawyer Nick Brown. “He cruelly threatened their lives in the event that they tried to flee from his violent sexual assaults. This prolonged sentence is important to discourage Mr. Yoeun and others who prey on youngsters.”
In his plea settlement, Yoeun admitted to, over the course of a number of years, utilizing grownup and little one residents of the Philippines to recruit greater than a dozen different youngsters to supply pornography. Yoeun additional admitted to travelling to the Philippines and fascinating in sexual acts with no less than 6 youngsters in change for nominal quantities of cash.
Prosecutors cited quite a few research exhibiting the long-term harm suffered by little one intercourse abuse victims, concluding, ”[f]urther analysis solely confirmed and expanded upon this rising understanding of those insidious results of childhood sexual trauma. Research now inform us that the quite a few little one victims on this case, as a direct consequence of the Defendant’s violent sexual assaults, will face an elevated threat of alcohol abuse, illicit drug use, sexual promiscuity, and suicide.”
Yoeun will probably be required to register as a intercourse offender after he’s launched from jail and will probably be on federal supervision for 15 years.
The FBI and U.S. Military CID, with the help of the Philippine Nationwide Police, investigated this case as a part of the South Sound Little one Exploitation Job Power. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Grady J. Leupold and Matthew P. Hampton.
This case was introduced as a part of Venture Protected Childhood, a nationwide initiative to fight the rising epidemic of kid sexual exploitation and abuse launched in Could 2006 by the Division of Justice. Led by United States Attorneys’ Places of work and the Legal Division’s Little one Exploitation and Obscenity Part (CEOS), Venture Protected Childhood marshals federal, state, and native assets to raised find, apprehend, and prosecute people who exploit youngsters by way of the Web, in addition to to establish and rescue victims. For extra details about Venture Protected Childhood, please go to www.justice.gov/psc