I'm not nearly as bad as they say: man accused of daughter's rape

An American awaiting extradition to the United States to answer charges of raping his daughter and distributing footage of it online has said he never hurt or threatened his 'pretty little tiger'.

Commenting publicly for the first time since his arrest at Chek Lap Kok airport on May 2 after a global manhunt, Kenneth Freeman did not deny raping his daughter, now 17, or manufacturing, possessing and distributing child pornography.

He also said he had travelled to Hong Kong from the mainland twice in the past year before Interpol issued a warrant for his arrest in March.

Freeman, 45, allegedly raped the girl when she was 13 and posted the images on the internet. His daughter appeared on the television show America's Most Wanted last December.

'I never physically hurt or threatened my daughter,' Freeman, a former reserve sheriff's deputy, said in a statement issued yesterday by his lawyer, Giles Surman.

Freeman complained in the statement that many 'terrible stories' had been written about him. 'I am not nearly as bad as they say, and I am not as good as I wish I was,' he said. He consented last month to be extradited after failing in a bid to have reporters excluded from committal proceedings in Eastern Court.