Officials charged a Winthrop man this week with sexually assaulting one of three boys he adopted from Columbia over the summer, authorities said. 

Kiyoshi Yu, 52, is charged with assault and battery on a child under 14, the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office said. A judge ordered him held on $2,500 bail. Yu is not to have contact with the children and must forfeit his passport as part of his bail agreement, authorities said.

Investigators said Yu adopted the three boys — ages 8, 9, and 13 — from Bogota last summer. One of the children said Yu repeatedly abused him in a Columbian hotel before coming to the United States, where the abuse continued, police alleged. 

The charge stems from one incident where Yu forced the boy to stroke his penis, the prosecutor said. 

Police began investigating Yu in August when Rhode Island officers found the boys in a car parked at a casino, where he was gambling the prosecutor said. They told the police that Yu made them sleep on the floor, would not let them shower, and made them wear the same clothes for days on end. 

BY JIM SALTER

A Christian boarding school in Missouri that’s been under intense scrutiny over abuse allegations announced Wednesday that it will close later this month due to financial hardship.

Agape Boarding School in Stockton has been the subject of state and location investigations and several lawsuits from former students. It will stop providing service effective Jan. 20, according to a statement from the school for boys.

Attendance at Agape plummeted after abuse allegations surfaced. Agape had 132 students 13 months ago, its lawyer, John Schultz said. It now has 12.

The school’s focus now is “on getting the boys who remain in the program safely transitioned to their parents or to foster care, other group homes or residential programs,” its former director, Bryan Clemensen, said in a statement.

Anna Maria Ciobanu

BUCHAREST -- In early December, Lucian Schepers dusted off his adoption file one more time. He thumbed through the stack of yellowed papers and translated what he could with the help of Google, trying once more to piece together the puzzle of his early life in communist Romania.

It seemed to him that every time he reexamined the documents, a new detail would emerge.

This time, Schepers found a discrepancy in a request by the municipal court in the Black Sea port city of Constanta for a medical document certifying that a minor is physically fit for adoption. It notes that Schepers was born in 1985, not 1986 as stated in his personal identification number (CNP).

It might have been a mundane mistake on a minor detail, but for Schepers it fueled doubts about what he truly knows about his own past. "I'm probably between 35 and 40," he jokes to friends. "I don't know which paper I should believe."

BY JASON POHL

Jill and Adam Ingwell are no strangers to taking chances. 

She’s traveled to roughly 50 countries. He’s been a competitive weightlifter. They’ve bicycled across Idaho and hiked mountains around the world. 

By 2019, the couple — both school educators in the foothills southeast of Sacramento — were growing serious about their next big journey: raising a child. 

The Ingwells had talked about it occasionally during their decade-plus relationship. Jill, however, learned at a young age that she had a rare condition that could result in a high-risk pregnancy and, possibly, a late-term miscarriage. They had accepted it. The couple filled their days working with children, Jill as an occupational therapist and Adam as a physical education teacher. 

Family ministry will guarantee full support and care for the children

Jessica Arena

Three children who were adopted by Maltese parents are under state care after the parents declared they no longer wished to care for them, Times of Malta has learned.

The children, who were adopted from a country outside the European Union through a private adoption agency, had been living in Malta for some time before the situation in the family home deteriorated and the parents expressed a desire to ‘return’ the children.

By John Paul Cordina

The adoptive parents of three children have declared that they did not wish to care for them any longer, forcing the state to step in.

The Times reported that the children had been adopted from outside of the EU through a private adoption agency, and that they had been living in Malta “for some time” before their adoptive parents expressed a desire to “return” them, after an apparent deterioration in the situation at the family home.

Quoting sources, the newspaper said that the parents had claimed behavioural issues, but these claims had not been corroborated by others who came in contact with the children on a regular basis.

As is the case whenever the state deems parents to be unfit to take care of the children they are responsible for, the authorities have stepped in, and the three children are now under a care order.

TIM HAHN   Erie Times-News

A Crawford County woman accused of causing her 11-year-old adopted son's death in 2021 by giving him windshield washer fluid to drink is now facing a March trial date.

The trial of 63-year-old Mary E. Diehl was moved to the March trial term in Crawford County last week after Diehl's lawyer, Eric Hackwelder, asked for a continuance. Hackwelder said he is continuing to consult with his expert in the case.

Diehl, who remains in prison without bond, faces one count of criminal homicide in the Sept. 5, 2021, death of Najir W. Diehl.

Najir, whom authorities said had special needs and had an extensive history of health-related problems, was found dead in bed at the family's home at 7621 Mallard Road in East Fairfield Township by Pennsylvania State Police troopers who were called there on the morning of Sept. 6, 2021.

By James Hanlon

A couple accused of transporting the body of an 8-year-old girl from Airway Heights to South Dakota has been charged with murder.

Aleksander Kurmoyarov, 28, and his girlfriend, Mandie Miller, 33, were arrested by police in Mitchell, South Dakota, on Wednesday, initially charged with failure to notify law enforcement of the death of a child.

The Spokane County Prosecutor’s Office is now seeking charges against Kurmoyarov and Miller for unlawful imprisonment, first-degree criminal mistreatment and second-degree murder.

The couple will continue to be held in South Dakota pending extradition to Washington State, according to a news release from the Airway Heights Police Department.

By Celina Van Hyning

AIRWAY HEIGHTS, Wash. — Warning: This story contains references to child abuse that may be disturbing to some readers.

New court documents reveal the Airway Heights couple arrested for failure to notify law enforcement of their 8-year-old adopted daughter's death consistently abused her, pulled her out of school in early 2022 and tied her up for multiple hours every day.

Additionally, reports of the couple's treatment of the child were made to local law enforcement and Child Protective Services (CPS). However, CPS caseworkers did not directly respond to the reports and police officers who responded were not able to make contact with the family.

28-year-old Aleksander Kurmoyarov and 33-year-old Mandie Miller were arrested in South Dakota on Thursday charged with one count of failure to notify law enforcement of the death of a child.  KREM 2 later learned the couple had a no-bond arrest warrant in Spokane County for homicide by abuse, in relation to the death of Miller's adopted daughter, Meela.

Auteur: Marlou Poncin

Klokkenluiders lopen nog altijd veel risico als ze een melding maken. Een nieuw wetsvoorstel van de minister van Binnenlandse Zaken moet daarbij helpen, maar volgens Tweede Kamerlid Renske Leijten (SP) gaat dat niet ver genoeg.

In toeslagenaffaire bijvoorbeeld overwoog topjurist Sandra Palmen, om naar buiten te treden, maar durfde ze het uiteindelijk niet. Niet zo gek, want met andere klokkenluiders liep het eerder vaak slecht af. Palmen schreef in 2017 als jurist bij de afdeling Toeslagen van de Belastingdienst al dat de fiscus "laakbaar" had gehandeld bij de stopzetting van de kinderopvangtoeslag. En dat ouders daardoor een compensatie verdienden.

Het probleem worden

In NOS Met het Oog op Morgen vertelde Palmen gisteravond dat duidelijk werd dat haar memo genegeerd zou worden, maar dat ze toch niet naar buiten durfde te treden.