Bay Area Man Pleads Not Guilty To Sex Tourism Charges
Date Posted: 5/3/2006

SAN FRANCISCO -- A Bay area man accused of carrying out so-called "sexual tourism" by having sex with two girls in Cambodia pleaded not guilty to the charges in federal court Thursday.

U.S. Magistrate James Larson set a detention hearing for May 4 and ordered Michael Koklich held in custody until then.

Koklich was arrested by Cambodian authorities in Phnom Penh in February and arrived in San Francisco on Wednesday, accompanied by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

He is accused in a March 28 grand jury indictment of two counts of illegal sexual conduct with underage girls in foreign places.

An affidavit by an ICE agent, filed in February with a criminal complaint, alleges that the two girls were 11 and 13 years old.

The affidavit alleges that the Koklich confessed to an ICE representative in Cambodia in February that he had had sex with 40 to 50 underage Cambodian girls since 2003.

U.S. authorities said Koklich previously lived in a recreational vehicle that he parked in various locations throughout the Bay area, often in Santa Rosa. He allegedly told ICE agents that he had been living eight to nine months a year in Cambodia, returning to California each summer to earn money for his trips.

Each count carries a possible sentence of up to 30 years in prison if Koklich is convicted.