Serial molester up for parole

A repeat child molester from Costa Mesa is scheduled for a parole hearing Monday, but prosecutors want to do everything in their power to make sure he isn’t freed, officials from the Orange County district attorney’s office announced Friday.

George Joseph England, 65, will be up for parole Monday in Soledad, where he’s housed in the Salinas Valley State Prison for molesting three girls in 1977.

England was convicted on three counts of molesting the girls in his Costa Mesa mobile home.

But he fled and was on the lam with his daughter for 29 years before he was arrested in Florida under a different name. His daughter was, in fact, a girl sold to him in Vietnam in 1972, while he worked there as a civilian contractor, officials said. They claim that England molested her, too, but he wasn’t charged for that alleged crime as she did not step forward early enough to press charges.

When England was sentenced in 2006, he was given three years to life in prison. Because the crimes happened 30 years ago, England had to be sentenced according to the laws at the time. Had he been convicted of the crime today, he would have been hit with a 45-year to life prison sentence, prosecutors said.

Attempts to reach England’s lawyer were unsuccessful Friday.

Prosecutors will file a petition during the parole hearing Monday to have England committed to a mental institution for life under the Sexually Violent Predator law.

Senior Deputy Dist. Atty. Rebecca Olivieri will be at Monday’s hearing Monday to oppose England’s release.