Convicted child molester gets 30 years in prison

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – A child molester convicted in Florida of sexually abusing a Vietnamese girl starting when she was 5 years old has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.

A federal judge agreed Friday with prosecutors on the toughest possible sentence for 66-year-old George Joseph England. A jury convicted him in January of five charges related to the abuse of the girl he bought in Vietnam in the early 1970s.

England was convicted of child abuse in California in 1977, but he fled to Florida and assumed a fake name. England was arrested in 2004 after the now-43-year-old victim contacted the FBI.

England was eventually returned to California to serve his original prison sentence. Just before his release a year ago, federal prosecutors filed the new charges in Florida.