LOS ANGELES _ When Meach Sovannara boarded a flight to Cambodia in 2015, his wife and three daughters knew there was a chance he might never return to their modest Long Beach, Calif., home.
Jamie Meach was no stranger to her husband's battles with the Cambodian government. It was Sovannara's activism, after all, that forced the family to seek asylum in the United States more than a decade earlier. He had returned to Cambodia since then, but protests that followed a controversial national election had endangered Sovannara's safety once more.
A dual citizen of the U.S. and Cambodia, Sovannara was charged with attempting to incite an insurrection in 2014 after delivering a speech at a protest in Phnom Penh, the country's capital.
Sovannara returned to the U.S. after being released on bond, but with a court hearing looming, he had a choice to make: Live safely in exile in Long Beach, or risk imprisonment to continue the fight against a government that has been widely criticized for human rights violations.
Despite the risks, Jamie Meach and her husband knew he had to return home.
In July 2015, Sovannara and 10 others were convicted of various crimes connected to the protests after what human rights activists have called a "show trial." Sovannara's attorneys were not allowed to enter closing arguments, and justices deliberated for 15 minutes before returning with a conviction, according to Amnesty International. Although no evidence was presented at trial, Sovannara was sentenced to 20 years in Prey Sar prison, a hellish, overcrowded complex where family and friends fear he could be killed at any moment.
An appeal of Sovannara's conviction was denied last year. But friends and activists hope a federal lawsuit brought against the Cambodian government in Los Angeles and diplomatic pressures exerted in Washington will help secure his release.
But as those wheels turn slowly, Sovannara's stand has left his family trapped in an international nightmare, one that has roiled Long Beach's sprawling Cambodian refugee community and agitated lawmakers tasked with managing diplomatic relations between Washington and Phnom Penh.
As they hold out hope, some say Sovannara made peace with the potential consequences of his decision long before returning to his native land.
"Meach Sovannara already knows his fate," said Bo K.S. Uce, a family friend and activist.
