Massachusetts placed immigrant children in hotels with registered sex offenders: report

According to the Boston Globe, individuals who have been convicted of child rape, indecent assault and battery on children, and child pornography were housed or working in at least five hotels and one dormitory used to house illegal immigrants and their children.

In a statement, the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities spokesperson, Kevin Connor, told the outlet, "The safety and wellbeing of the 7,500 families in Emergency Assistance shelter is a priority for our administration." He added, "We will continue to take all possible steps to ensure the safety of EA residents and carefully review any situation that comes before us to act quickly to protect families.”

Connor claimed that the agency checks every six months to see if the shelter addresses come up on the Sex Offender Registry Board. After a 15-year-old Haitian girl was allegedly raped in one of the shelters by a 26-year-old man, Governor Healey claimed, "Everybody, including him, who enters our shelter locations is vetted."

In reaction to the report, the executive director of the Association of Haitian Women, Carline Desire said, "This shouldn't be happening." She added, "They need to get those sex offenders out."

While investigating the shelters they found with registered sex offenders working or living at, the Globe reported that there were no signs the families living there were informed that someone on the sex offender registry was there. One Massachusetts resident living with his daughters in one of the hotels told the outlet he had never seen a poster or been given information about a sex offender in their hotel.

"These posters of sex offenders are hanging out at the police station, they should be here,” he said. "There are a lot of kids here.”