OSLO, Nov. 12 (Xinhua) -- A 40-year-old Norwegian recidivist was sentenced to 15 years in preventive custody for sexual offense against dozens of girls, public broadcaster NRK reported Tuesday.
According to Norwegian law, the conduct is equated with rape when the child is under 14 years old.
The abuses happened both online and at physical meetings and the man is convicted for violations of the Penal Code, NRK reported.
The man was also sentenced to pay compensation of 960,000 Norwegian kroner (104,918 U.S. dollars) in total to ten of the victims.
Preventive custody is a punishment, the main purpose of which is to protect the public from a dangerous offender in future.
In order to sentence a criminal to preventive custody, there must be an imminent danger that the convicted person will again commit a serious crime.
"The danger of recurrence is obvious, both in the short and the long term," said Oyvind Panzer Iversen, judge of a district court.
Fifteen years of preventive custody is the right punishment, Bjorn Kristian Soknes, senior public prosecutor, told NRK.
The man has previously been sentenced to prison for assault three times, in 2012, 2015 and 2017 respectively.
The police arrested the man again in December last year, when they found over 80,000 illegal pictures and 4,700 illegal videos in his computer.
The court considers that simply another imprisonment would not be sufficient, NRK reported.
