Courts | Prosecution drops Costa Nunes Kindergarten sexual abuse case

The Public Prosecutions Office (MP) has decided to drop the case of the alleged sexual abuse of children at the
D. José da Costa Nunes Kindergarten, Ponto Final newspaper reported, citing sources among the parents of children enrolled at the kindergarten.

According to the report, parents have been receiving notifications from the MP since last Friday, reaffirming the prosecution’s decision in dropping the case based on a “lack of evidence.”

The case, which has been ongoing since last May, has been the target of criticism since the start as parents have been unhappy with the methods employed by the Judiciary Police (PJ) during the investigation of sexual abuse.
On numerous occasions, including during a press conference held by lawmaker Agnes Lam, parents criticized the PJ and accused them of having a lack of knowledge in questioning children regarding this sensitive matter.

With the MP dropping the case, some parents have once more criticized the PJ of carrying out a poor investigation.

“In our [the parents’] view the investigation was not well done. There were many flaws. When we have cases like this, they [the PJ] should pay attention to details and they simply were not prepared to deal with it,” one father said to Ponto Final adding, “what has been reported is not according to what was said by the children [to PJ].”

The father also noted that, “the children have been able to demonstrate how they were abused, but the report says otherwise,” remarking that children, several times, demonstrated how they were abused through the use of a doll.

The president of the Parents Association of the Kindergarten, Rui Barbosa, told TDM Radio, “we are not entitled to do any kind of interpretation to the decision of the Public Prosecutions Office. Parents will now have the right, if they see that it is the right thing to do, to appeal and follow all the procedures. Each person will decide for themselves the steps they want to take. [As far as the Association is concerned,] we only want justice to be served and all parents to see this issue solved as quickly as possible.”

The case has also generated several other complaints against staff who provided cleaning services and also assisted in the hygiene of children at the time, as well as an investigation into the administrative procedures.  The Association for Macanese Education (APIM), which owns the establishment, decided to fire the staff member involved and this decision received the support of the parents’ association.

Internal investigations into the behavior of several other staff members, such as the director of the kindergarten, the psychologist and the class teacher were also carried out by the APIM, suggesting potential disciplinary procedures.
The psychologist was suspended from employment duties, and investigations continued to ascertain the roles of the class and school heads in this case. The president of APIM, Miguel Senna Fernandes said over the summer that the investigations were still ongoing. Nevertheless, he expressed confidence that there was enough material to proceed with disciplinary actions, which could range from issuing a warning to the termination of employment.

The Education and Youth Affairs Bureau carried out an investigation into the administrative procedures taken by the school, resulting in fining the institution MOP12,000 for the breach of some rules of the procedure code when dealing with this type of case.

The Kindergarten staff member accused of sexually abusing the children was questioned and subjected to periodical presentations to the authorities.

According to what is known from the investigations, the medical examination reports of the two alleged female victims showed no evidence of sexual abuse.