Blue State Housed Migrant Children In Hotels With Sex Offenders: REPORT

A Massachusetts agency reportedly housed homeless and migrant families with young children in the same hotels as registered sex offenders, according to the Boston Globe.

The state placed hundreds of homeless migrant families in at least six locations with sex offenders convicted of crimes against children, including pornography, rape and assault, the Boston Globe reported. Democratic Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey’s Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities rejected the outlet’s requests for information on sex offenders, but said after the outlet identified offenders that the agency checks shelters against the registry every sixth months.

“The safety and wellbeing of the 7,500 families in Emergency Assistance shelter is a priority for our administration,” a spokesman for the agency, Keven Connor, told the Boston Globe. “We will continue to take all possible steps to ensure the safety of EA residents and carefully review any situation that comes before us to act quickly to protect families.”

Families in locations with sex offenders, like at the Baymont Hotel, where a man convicted of “repeatedly and indecently assaulting” a girl under 14 is reportedly living or at the Colonial Traveler Inn, where an offender convicted of rape and child abuse is reportedly living, did not seem to be notified, the outlet reported.

One offender, who lives at a former Salem State University dormitory being used to house migrants and was convicted of rape and abuse of a child in 2012, was removed, the agency told the Boston Globe after the outlet identified him.

Massachusetts has spent nearly $1 billion to house migrant families coming into the state and is supporting around 23,000 people, according to the Boston Globe.

In March, an illegal immigrant from Haiti allegedly raped a 15-year-old girl in a hotel being used as a shelter.

The housing agency and the governor’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.