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Valentin Ortiz, 73, of Reading, was sentenced to five years and 11 months in prison, followed by five years of supervised release, and was ordered to pay $10,000 restitution, United States Attorney Jacqueline C. Romero said.
Ortiz was convicted in November 2021 of one count of travel in foreign commerce with the intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, and two counts of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place.
The charges arose from an investigation that began when Ortiz, a naturalized US citizen, applied to bring his spouse to the country by filing paperwork with US Citizenship and Immigration Services in June 2018, Romero said.
He had listed the date of their marriage as August 2013, when she was 18 and he was 65, authorities said.
Investigators later discovered that beginning in 2007, when Ortiz was 59 and the victim was only 12 years old, he pursued and maintained a sexual relationship with her when he traveled to the Dominican Republic.
This relationship led to the victim becoming pregnant with their two children when she was 13 and 15 years old, respectively, authorities said.
“Valentin Ortiz is a sexual predator who targeted a very young and vulnerable victim, traveling internationally so he could prey on this child without the same legal consequences as he might face in the United States,” US Attorney Romero said.
“But as a US citizen, he is prohibited from engaging in such abhorrent conduct abroad, and accordingly, he has now been held accountable for his crimes.”
The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations and is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Josh A. Davison.
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