Convicted child molester Gerard Zalewski of Montgomery County was extradited to the United States after nearly 20 years in England

PENNSYLVANIA (WPVI) — A convicted child molester from Montgomery County was extradited from England to the United States last week.

According to the Montgomery County District Attorney's Office, 41-year-old Gerard Zalewski failed to show up for his bail hearing in 2006.

It happened before his sentencing hearing on child rape charges.

The original charges against Zalewski in Montgomery County stemmed from an investigation in the summer of 2004.

At that time, Zalewski had several explicit online conversations with an undercover police officer who posed as a 12-year-old girl.

Zalewski later arranged a meeting with the undercover agent, whom he believed to be a young girl, and who was arrested on August 15, 2004.

Investigators later discovered that he had previously had sexual contact with a 13-year-old girl from Bucks County whom he met online in June 2004.

On November 14, 2005, Zalewski pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree felonies in connection with the incident. He was free on bail awaiting sentencing when he failed to appear for a hearing on March 29, 2006.

He was sentenced in absentia to a prison term of five to twenty years.

“We have been waiting to get justice for our victim who was sexually abused by Zalewski,” said District Attorney Kevin Steele. “Now that he is back on American soil, he not only faces 5 to 20 years in prison, but also new charges of escape and failure to appear. This defendant, who has been exposed as a sexually violent offender, will be off the streets for a very long time.”

After being placed on the FBI's most wanted list, Zalewski was tracked down in England ten years later and convicted on similar charges.

According to English police, he was arrested in June 2016 and pleaded guilty in October 2016 to two counts: penetrative sexual activity with a child, meeting a child after sexual intercourse, taking indecent photographs of a child and false imprisonment.

According to authorities, he abused a 13-year-old girl on the Internet, manipulated her into sending explicit images, and then sexually abused her for hours in a park.

He spent 12 years in an English prison before being sent back to the United States on August 23.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for September 4.