A US soldier who darted into North Korea has been charged with eight offenses ranging from desertion and assault to solicitation of child pornography.
Travis King, 23, ran across the Demilitarized Zone on July 18 and was promptly captured by North Korean authorities.
Officials have accused Travis King, an American soldier who fled into North Korea this summer, of offenses including desertion, assault, and soliciting child pornographyReuters
APKing dashed across the Demilitarized Zone on July 28 before he was released and flown back to the US last month[/caption]
ReutersKing’s mother Claudine Gates has asked that he be afforded the presumption of innocence[/caption]
He remained in custody there until last month, when American and Swedish officials managed to broker his release.
King is now facing eight different charges, according to Reuters, which broke the news.
The soldier, who was flown to a military hospital in Texas on September 28, has not publicly explained why he ran across the border.
Military officials have deferred questions about King’s legal fate for weeks.
They said their efforts had been focused on nursing him back to health after he was in captivity for two months.
King is accused of using Snapchat to “knowingly and willingly” solicit another user to “produce child pornography” in July.
Last October, he allegedly attempted to escape from US military custody.
The private also faced two allegations of assault in South Korea.
King pleaded guilty to assault and destroying public property after he damaged a police car during a profane tirade against Koreans.
For that, he opted to spend more than a month in prison instead of paying a fine.
King was slated was slated to face disciplinary action in the US after his release.
But on his way home, King slipped out Seoul’s airport and made his way to the North Korean border.
There, the soldier joined a tour group and escaped into the isolated communist nation.
Reuters also received a statement from the soldier’s mother Claudine Gates.
She asked that King be afforded the presumption of innocence.
“The man I raised, the man I dropped off at boot camp, the man who spent the holidays with me before deploying did not drink,” Gates said.
“A mother knows her son, and I believe something happened to mine while he was deployed. The Army promised to investigate what happened at Camp Humphreys, and I await the results.”
King and his family are being represented by a legal team including Franklin Rosenblatt, who served as lead military defense counsel during the court proceedings against Bowe Bergdahl.
That soldier was held in Taliban captivity for five years after he walked off his post in Afghanistan in 2009.
The US Army didn’t immediately respond to The U.S. Sun’s request for comment.
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