Outrage grows over shelter abuse, criminal complaint calls for heads to roll

Outrage continued to spread on Monday over the reported abuse of children warehoused in shelters under the umbrella of the government body entrusted with their care and protection (Senniaf).

Protestors moved from the Senniaf offices in to the headquarters of the Public Ministry and the Ministry of Social Development to demand justice.

 A criminal complaint was filed with the Public Ministry (MP)

calling for the firing of María Inés Castillo  Minister of Social Development (Mides), and Mayra Silvera, director of Senniaf,

The complaint was filed by lawyer Abdiel Enrique González, on behalf of the human rights activist Niura Rodríguez Bárcenas, to investigate Castillo and the vice minister of that portfolio, Milagros Ramos, as well as Silvera, for the alleged commission of the crimes of abuse of authority and violation of the duties of public servants, related to the management of shelters.

The complaint also reaches the former head of Mides Markova Concepción; and to the former director and former deputy director of the Senniaf Sara Rodríguez and Carla García, recently named governor of Panama.

The appeal also asks that the actions of the directors of the shelters in which abuses and crimes against the freedom and sexual integrity of minors have been committed, and for the alleged commission of crimes against collective security and organized crime be investigated .

The complaint is based on article 328-A of the Penal Code, which establishes that whoever belongs to an organized group for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation and pornography with minors will be punished with a penalty of 15 to 30 years in prison.

The document specifies that details of the facts can be found in the report prepared by a subcommittee of the Commission for Women, Children, Youth and the Family of the National Assembly,

The complaint cites a statement by Jorge Giannareas, a specialist in social policy at the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), who assured that children who ar in shelters are under the responsibility of the State and that the fact that the administration of those establishments is in the hands of a non-governmental organization is not a reason to diminish that responsibility.

Hours after this legal action was presented, various organizations grouped together in Panama Citizen Power, and others, picketed in front of the headquarters of the Public Ministry to demand that Attorney General Eduardo Ulloa accelerate the investigations.

Aida Torres, one of the protesters, considered that the report delivered by the subcommittee of the National Assembly has elements for prosecutors to take swift action in order to find those responsible for the abuses.

In addition, she requested the provisional separation of the directors of Senniaf until the investigations are completed.

 Rebeca Osorio, from the Federation of Professionals of Panama, blamed the current directors of the entity for not acting with sufficient diligence to report the events and, instead, waited for a legislative subcommittee to make public “the situations aberrant ”that children experience in shelters