Boston man gets hard-labor sentence in North Korea

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea sentenced a Boston man to eight years of hard labor and ordered him to pay a $700,000 fine for crossing into the communist country illegally earlier this year, state media reported today.

Aijalon Mahli Gomes, 30, was the fourth American detained by North Korea for illegal entry in less than a year.

Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee were held for five months before their release last August, and activist Robert Park was expelled some 40 days after crossing into the country last Christmas.

Gomes, who had been teaching English in South Korea before his arrest, acknowledged his wrongdoing at Pyongyang's Central Court on Tuesday, North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency said in a brief dispatch.

Gomes was sentenced to eight years of "hard labor" and fined 70 million North Korean won, said the report monitored in Seoul. North Korea's official exchange rate is 100 won to the U.S. dollar.