Managua - A Canadian man was sentenced to eight years in prison in Nicaragua for sexually predatory behaviour towards a 16-year-old girl he illegally “adopted,” a court official said.
Phillips Barry Hilderbrand was sentenced on May 20 to “five years in prison for sexual harassment leading to light psychological harm, and three years and six months for drug possession,” a spokesman for Nicaragua's high criminal court told AFP.
The 62-year-old struck a deal with the girl's mother in January 2015 to take the teen, raise her and have her educated in exchange for paying money and promising to build the mother a house.
He then took the girl to live with him at his residence in the southwestern town of Rivas, where the prosecution says he made unwanted sexual advances.
Police arrested Hilderbrand in February this year, and also apprehended the mother on a charge of sex trafficking, for which she faces trial.
Under Nicaraguan law, adoptions are only recognised when approved by the family ministry and a civil judge.
The Canadian embassy in the country declined to comment on the case, telling AFP that a privacy law prevented it from speaking about consular matters.
AFP