Relatives of 15 children killed in a fire at an orphanage continued to show up outside the burned-out compound Saturday seeking news about their missing kids.
The gates to the two-story, walled compound were shut and guards shooed away visitors and journalists asking for information and access to the building.
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Relatives of 15 children killed in a fire at an orphanage continued to show up outside the burned-out compound Saturday seeking news about their missing kids.
“ I came to find out if my granddaughter, Louisimon, is here," he said. "If she died, God took her away."
Haitian authorities went to the group's second orphanage Friday and removed about two dozen children, but did not close the facility until alternative quarters could be found for the remaining children.
The Associated Press previously reported on a long-standing series of problems at the two children's homes run by the Church of Bible Understanding, which is based in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
AP journalists visited the homes, holding a total of 120 kids, in 2013 and found bunk beds with faded and worn mattresses crowded into dirty rooms. Sour air wafted through the bathrooms and stairwells. Rooms were dark and spartan, lacking comforts or decoration.
A civil protection worker shovels charred debris from inside the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding where a fire broke out the previous night in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this Haitian children’s home run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing 13 children, health care workers said Friday. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
Eighty-year-old Simon Comie came looking for his 4-year-old granddaughter and was told to return Tuesday because officials had no information on the girl.
Nurses Valein Elda, left center, and Ricelin Chantale, tend to 14-year-old Miguelson Joseph at the Baptiste Mission Hospital in Kenscoff, just outside of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday, Feb. 15, 2020. Miguelson was injured when he jumped from a balcony at a branch of the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding, trying to flee during a raid in which police were ordered to remove the children, after a fire swept through a nearby orphanage also run by the Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing 15 children, officials said Friday. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
“ I came to find out if my granddaughter, Louisimon, is here," he said. "If she died, God took her away."
The home, located in the hills above the capital, is run by the Pennsylvania-based Church of Bible Understanding, which also operates another orphanage nearby. The nonprofit group runs antique stores in New York and Los Angeles called Olde Good Things to fund its operations in Haiti.
About half of the kids who died were babies or toddlers and the others were about 10 or 11 years old, workers at the home said. They said the blaze started around 9 p.m. Thursday and it took firefighters about 90 minutes to arrive.
The Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding stands with blackened walls the morning after a fire broke out in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this orphanage run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing over a dozen children, according to health care workers. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
Haitian authorities went to the group's second orphanage Friday and removed about two dozen children, but did not close the facility until alternative quarters could be found for the remaining children.
“I heard the orphanage caught fire, and I don’t have a radio at home, so I came this morning to get more information," said Marie-Louise Jean, who is in her 50s. She found her 11-year-old daughter Marie-France at another facility.
"I did everything to give her a good life. I am glad she is alive," the woman said.
Staff workers of the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding cry outside the children's home, the morning after a deadly fire broke out at the facility in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this orphanage run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing 13 children, according to health care workers. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
The Associated Press previously reported on a long-standing series of problems at the two children's homes run by the Church of Bible Understanding, which is based in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
“'We are aware of the fire in the children’s home in Haiti,” Temi J. Sacks, a spokesman for the group, said Friday. “It would be irresponsible for us to comment until after all the facts are in.”
The group lost accreditation for its homes after a series of inspections beginning in November 2012. Haitian inspectors faulted the group for overcrowding, unsanitary conditions and not having enough adequately trained staff.
A child's shoe and a dress lay inside the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding where a fire broke out the previous night in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this orphanage run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing over a dozen children, according to health care workers. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
AP journalists visited the homes, holding a total of 120 kids, in 2013 and found bunk beds with faded and worn mattresses crowded into dirty rooms. Sour air wafted through the bathrooms and stairwells. Rooms were dark and spartan, lacking comforts or decoration.
Rose-Marie Louis, a staff worker at the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding, holds her head amid the charred children's home, including the unrecognizable body of a child marked by a yellow piece of paper, bottom right, in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this orphanage run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing over a dozen children, according to health care workers. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)
A civil protection worker shovels charred debris from inside the Orphanage of the Church of Bible Understanding where a fire broke out the previous night in Kenscoff, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Friday, Feb. 14, 2020. A fire swept through this Haitian children’s home run by a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit group, killing 13 children, health care workers said Friday. (AP PhotoDieu Nalio Chery)