USA received 4\,500 complaints of sexual abuse on unaccompanied minors from 2014-18

USA received 4,500 complaints of sexual abuse on unaccompanied minors from 2014-18

ANI  |  US 

It has been revealed that the received more than 4,500 complaints of sexual abuse against unaccompanied minors from 2014-18, as per internal agency documents released by on Tuesday.

"I am deeply concerned with documents that have been turned over by HHS that record a high number of sexual assaults on unaccompanied children in the custody of the Office of Refugee and Resettlement," the from stated.

"Together, these documents detail an environment of systemic sexual assaults by staff on unaccompanied children," he further said at a House hearing, held on Tuesday, on the US administration's "zero tolerance" policy, which led to the separation of scores of immigrant children from their parents.

The complaints have been filed with the US Department of Health and Human Services, in addition to 1,303 complaints reported with the Justice Department.

Deutch outlines that the documents "demonstrate over the past three years, there have been 154 staff on unaccompanied minor, let me repeat that, staff on allegations of sexual assault."

"This works out on average to one sexual assault by HHS staff on per week," reports while quoting Deutch.

A few of the staff members, reported in complaints with the Justice Department, are accused of having relationships with minors, indulging in unwanted sexual touching and showing the minors pornographic videos, further reported while quoting Axios. Out of the thousands of complaints, there are 178 accusations against the adult staff.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First Published: Wed, February 27 2019. 03:14 IST