State suspends Center for Human Development from sheltering homeless after mishandled allegations of sex abuse

AMHERST – The state stopped placing homeless families in Center of Human Development programs last month and ordered the Springfield nonprofit to close its Jessie’s House shelter in Amherst after the agency failed to properly report allegations that employees sexually harassed a resident, one of them coercing her into sex.

The state has paid the agency $70 million to house homeless families over the last three years.

As first reported by the Boston Globe , one of the since-fired employees coerced a 37-year-old immigrant woman living in the shelter into a sexual relationship. That employee later threatened the young mother with deportation, saying he was an Immigration and Customs Enforcement worker, according to documents obtained by the Globe and confirmed to The Republican by CHD.

A second worker, also suspended and then terminated, harassed the same woman, who is the mother of a young child.

The unnamed woman reported the abuse July 1 to staff at Cooley Dickinson Hospital in Northampton. The Center for Human Development placed a phone call July 2 to the Massachusetts Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, according to Benjamin Craft, vice president of community engagement at CHD.

But CHD did not file a written report until July 7, Craft said. He acknowledged that CHD should have notified the state Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, which oversees shelters, in writing sooner.

“That was a miss on our part,” Craft said in a phone interview Friday.

He said there was a scramble to care for the woman and to ascertain the facts.

“We immediately implemented a plan for addressing these issues and we remain committed to working closely with EOHLC to ensure all needs for remediation are met,” Craft said.

The state office met with CHD leadership on July 8, 9, and 11 and will work with the agency on continued corrective action during the suspension.

“CHD has been placed on probation while we conduct a thorough investigation,” agency spokeswoman Tara Smith said in an email Friday.

CHD has not been told of a time frame for the investigation, Craft said.

Jessie’s House has space for as many as six families and can accommodate them for up to six months. Founded in 1983, it is located in a old Victorian house downtown that once housed the minister of the nearby Congregational Church.

The Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities confirmed that staff with the Springfield agency passed criminal background checks through both the Criminal Offender Record Information system (CORI) and Sex Offender Registry Information systems (SORI).

Shelter providers are required to perform CORI and SORI checks on all staff, including subcontracted staff, prior to hiring and periodically after hiring.

“Both individuals had been fully vetted prior to hire and successfully passed background checks. Following the investigation process, both the individuals involved had their employment terminated fully and immediately,” Craft said in an emailed statement.

He said CHD works to be thorough in its hiring, intercepting potential problems.

“Unfortunately, that’s not always a realistic expectation,” he said.

The woman told CHD that a housing specialist first invited her to a hotel room. She then went to a house with him. He recorded all their interactions on his phone, the Globe reported.

Besides threatening her with immigration enforcement, the CHD employee said he would not assist her with housing if she did not comply with his demands for sex.

Another employee, a direct care worker, sent messages to the woman in Spanish telling her “good day my love,” calling her “beautiful,” and wishing her “sweet dreams,” according to the report.

The Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities said police were called and CHD is cooperating with law enforcement.

Laurie Loisel, spokeswoman for the Northwestern District Attorney’s Office, said Friday she can’t confirm or deny the existence of a criminal investigation. Amherst police didn’t return calls Friday about the situation.

The number of families being served by the Center for Human Development fluctuates, but the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities most recently inspected 265 units managed by CHD.

Craft said CHD houses 130 families and 50 individual adults in those 256 units.

That volume swelled with the arrival of migrants and other homeless people over the last several years. Recently, Massachusetts closed all hotel shelters, a process that ended only earlier this month.

“Safety is the most important tenet of our work and is instilled in all our policies and practices,” Craft said in a statement.

Read the original article on MassLive .