US

REPORT: Child Welfare Agency Contracted By City Pays Three Sisters $6 Million For Returning Them Back To Abusive Father

[Shutterstock/ New Africa]

Gabrielle Temaat Contributor
Font Size:

A child welfare agency paid three sisters $6 million after returning them to their sexually abusive father, according to an article by The Philadelphia Inquirer published Thursday.

“What these girls experienced was unspeakable,” said Nadeem Bezar of Kline & Specter law firm, who represented the sisters, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

“I am sickened that a person, let alone their father, could have done these horrible things to these children,” Bezar said. “I am happy that we were able to achieve a recovery that will give these girls some opportunity for a future.” (RELATED: Advocates Of Child Abuse Victims Fear Continued Rise In Abuse Reports Due To Lockdown Orders)

The father of the sisters was reportedly convicted of sexual abuse and is serving 37 years in prison.

The girls were between the ages of 9 and 14 when they were repeatedly raped and beat by their father. The agency, Turning Points for Children, placed the girls in an aunt’s home in 2015, but they were removed after reports of further abuse from the father’s girlfriend emerged, The Inquirer reported.

They were reunited with their father in 2016 despite his criminal charges and lack of housing and income. A settlement was reached and Turning Points is giving the girls $6 million. The agency is retained by Philadelphia’s Department of Human Services, but the payment did not include any city funds, The Inquirer reported.

“You’re basically giving the children back to a homeless, unemployed man, who has a history of an attempted kidnapping of a woman, and who has recently been accused of trying to sexually assault his girlfriend,” Bezar said, according to The Inquirer.

The Philadelphia Children’s Alliance discovered the full extent of the man’s abuse during an interview with the sisters in 2017, The Inquirer reported.

Texas officials investigated claims of child sex abuse in a facility housing migrants in San Antonio in April. Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called for the children to be taken to federal facilities. In addition, as many as 80% of migrant women are raped while traveling to the U.S., according to estimates from 2018.