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Vietnam jails Canadian teacher for sexually abusing homeless boys

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Vadim Scott Benderman.
Agence France-Presse

Vietnam has jailed a Canadian teacher for four years for sexually abusing underage homeless boys he met on Hanoi’s streets, a court official said on Thursday, in a rare prosecution for the offence.

Vadim Scott Benderman, 46, who taught English at a foreign language centre and played music in bars in Hanoi, was found guilty at a trial in the capital Hanoi on Wednesday.

“He was charged for having sex with four local homeless teenaged boys he met in the centre of Hanoi between late 2014 and his arrest in the middle of last year,” the clerk said.

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According to local media reports, Benderman met the boys in central Hanoi before luring them to his apartment and paying them around US$13 for sex.

The indictment said his “behaviour infringed upon the teenagers' physical and psychological development,” according to a report on the VNExpress news site.

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It also “badly influenced [Vietnam's] customs and causing social disorder”, the report added.

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