CPFSA awaiting court order to remove wards from Sunbeam Children's Home

By Kimone Witter    

 

The Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA) is awaiting an order from the court to remove the 52 children from the Sunbeam Children's Home in St. Catherine after an investigation into cases of child abuse.

 

The agency announced on Wednesday that the facility would be delicensed after internal investigations revealed that instances of child abuse were continuing at the facility.

 

The manager of Sunbeam Children's Home, Desmond Whitely, on Wednesday complained about the handling of the matter, including the investigations into the cases of abuse.

 

But Chief Executive Officer of the CPFSA Laurette Adams-Thomas has said there was consistent communication with the management of the facility and opportunities were provided to correct the deficiencies, including staff participating in behaviour modification training.

 

Mrs. Adams-Thomas said when she took over leadership of the CPFSA in October, meetings were held with the management of all children's homes and the zero tolerance approach to child abuse was emphasised.

 

Providing details of the Sunbeam matter, she said cases of physical abuse at the facility were reported to the National Children's Registry dating back to 2020.

 

Mrs. Adams-Thomas said subsequent investigations were carried out in conjunction with the Office of the Children's Advocate and the allegations were proven to be true.

 

She noted that the latest report of abuse at Sunbeam Children's Home was made in January of this year. 

 

"With all of this occurring and the reports coming back from the [Children's] Advocate confirming cases of abuse, our investigations confirming these cases of abuse and then knowing that the management is aware of these cases and that we would have tried to train the employees, and then as recent as January this year, 2024, another case had occurred that we had to forward to the police - at some point, you have to do something," she asserted. 

 

Mrs. Adams-Thomas said the Children's Home has been closed and the CPFSA is awaiting the go ahead from the court to relocate the wards. 

 

"There is a location that we are going to move them to. So for those who will be relocated to another child care facility, we are ensuring that we keep them together," she said. 

 

The CPFSA head was a guest Thursday on TVJ's Smile Jamaica.