Raped “shelter” girls forced to abort – report

Revelations that girls reported being impregnated by religious staff and then forced to have an abortion while in shelters of the National Secretariat for Children, Adolescents and Family (Senniaf) are contained in a report published in La Estrella.

There are “girls who denounce that religious left them pregnant and abortions were committed,” Deputy Zulay Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly’s Commission for Women, Children, Youth, and the Family.  The committee has been investigating systematic abuse over years of dozens of minors in state-run shelters. The investigation  was sparked by the firing of two social workers who reported their concerns

Rodríguez,  said that the physical and mental abuses were committed by the “inmates” or personnel in charge of the children in at least 14 shelters investigated

Faced with nine days of public outrage, President  Cortizo, was forced to transmit a message to the nation on television in which he promised to find and punish those responsible for the abuses, without giving details of what actions his government has taken or in what direction.

Several minors were sexually abused by “inmates” since 2015 in at least 14 shelters in Panama, and girls reported having become pregnant by religious who ran the homes, Rodríguez told EFE.” and there is even a case of a minor who “was repeatedly abused for five years, from 10 to 15 years,” said the deputy,

A parliamentary subcommittee produced a 700-page report that details that dozens of minors were sexually abused, physically and psychologically abused in shelters across the country, institutions that run private organizations such as various NGOs and foundations, but are under the supervision of the State, which It also grants them public funds.

According to the parliamentary investigation, shelters were found without the regulatory operating permit, without qualified personnel, with “inhumane conditions” of life, and that many of the victims of abuse are minors with some disability.

The Attorney General’s Office, where Rodríguez and other deputies presented the parliamentary report last week, has said that it has 8 investigations open for irregularities in shelters, some of up to two years and that there are defendants, although the details of these cases are unknown.