Child molester extradited to Florida

A convicted child molester who once lived in Costa Mesa was taken into federal custody Monday and faces extradition to Florida on charges he crossed state lines with an underage girl to have sex with her there.

George Joseph England, 65, was picked up by U.S. marshals at the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison at Corcoran, officials from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.

England is facing federal charges in Florida that he took a girl he called his daughter from California to Florida with plans to have sex with her.

The charges stem from a statement that a Florida woman made to the FBI two weeks ago.

Jackie Zudis, 42, told authorities England bought her from her mother in Vietnam when she was 5 years old. She alleged in a videotaped statement released to the media by the FBI that England claimed she was his daughter and molested her for 11 years until she was 16 in their Costa Mesa home and in Florida.

If those allegations proved true, it would not matter in the eyes of the law, as the statute of limitations in California will have expired because the woman alleges she was molested in the 1970s, Orange County prosecutors have said.

However, because England was a fugitive from a molestation conviction in California when he fled to Florida with Zudis, the statute of limitations on the federal charges does not apply.

England was scheduled to be paroled Friday, but federal authorities put a hold on his release.

He served only three years for the molestations because he was sentenced under laws from 30 years ago, when he was convicted.

— Joseph Serna