GOVERNMENT has reportedly launched a probe into the function of a shelter for children and battered women on the Corentyne, after allegations surfaced that three girls had previously fled the institution.

Carmen Kissoon, president of Camal’s International Home for the Homeless and Battered Women, has also alleged that the girls have threatened to commit suicide if they had not been allowed to leave the home located at Albion, located a short distance from the police station.
Reports reaching this newspaper indictate that after Kissoon called in officers of the Probation and Welfare Department, a magistrate ordered that the girls be sent to the New Opportunity Corps on the Essequibo Coast. However, this newspaper was informed that the girls had been kept at the Albion Police Station for more than two weeks, pending submission of the Probation Department’s report.
According to Human Services Minister, Jennifer Webster, the girls have since been removed from the Albion Police Station and are in the custody of the Child Care and Protection Agency (CCPA) of her ministry.
Enquiries as to whether the girls would be sent to the NOC have elicited from Minister Webster a response that she did not know if that step would be taken. Two of the girls, aged fifteen and thirteen, are said to be sisters whose parents died of AIDS four years ago, leaving them as orphans.
Minister Webster reiterated that the ministry had been previously unaware of the matter involving the young girls. She has indicated that a team under the leadership of Ms. Ayo Dalgetty-Dean would conduct hearings into the operations of the Albion home. The other members of that team are Saudia Feroze; Irma Bovell; and Joanne Edghill, lawyer for the CCPA. They are expected to begin their work on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Kissoon has denied allegations that inmates at the home were badly treated.

(By Alex Wayne)