Expose Human Trafficking at Son of God Orphanage in Haiti
We are petitioning CNN to bring their international media voice and passion for ending slavery into the Son of God Orphanage. Please urge CNN to expose the corruption within the Haitian government, and allow international organizations to secure the children from the child traffickers who are now controlling the orphanage.
The evidence in hand shows:
• Children have been and are currently being trafficked from the Son of God Orphanage. The evidence on human trafficking leads back to the Son of God Orphanage. The orphanage director was imprisoned in July as part of a police-led operation that resulted in his conviction of trafficking a child.
• Haitian investigators have told our team the evidence suggests trafficking, as well.
• Numerous photos show extreme physical abuse and neglect. U.S. and Haitian doctors have documented cases of severe abuse and neglect including burns and broken bones.
• As recently as October 10, 2011, American volunteers took children with late-stage starvation out of the orphanage and to local doctors. Without this intervention, the doctors confirmed the children would have died of starvation.
This orphanage must be shut down. Other orphanages are ready and willing to take these children. Please urge CNN to cover this story and work to close this orphanage and re-locate the children immediately.
Sincerely,
[Your name]1
The petition worked. Within twelve hours, more than ten thousand people signed. My phone started buzzing with calls from reporters and other media types, and I could tell something big was going to happen. Where I’d felt so stuck, defeated, and alone in my battle with the orphanage, now I felt as though a wall had been knocked down and everything was changing. I was ready for some good news, and I got some. My phone buzzed yet again, and this time I tried to process what I heard when I answered the phone, but all I could remember were the words president’s office.
My heart sped up. Someone from the office of the president of Haiti was calling me. The man on the other end of the line asked me a few questions about the contents of the petition. With each question, I took a deep breath and tried to explain, to the best of my ability and knowledge of the facts, the truth about the selling of children at Son of God Orphanage.
The voice on the phone grew quiet, as if he was shocked and confused about how something like this could happen in Haiti. I was shocked, too, but my shock was because he was shocked this was happening in Haiti.
We talked more. I decided this was the perfect time for him to hear a little more about one of the biggest industries in the world. I explained the whole situation with Gabriel, and the dozens of other children who were missing from the orphanage. He thanked me for caring for the people of Haiti. Toward the end of the conversation, he asked if I could come in person to the presidential palace in Port-au-Prince to talk about the situation in the morning. Tomorrow morning? I was shocked, but I found my voice and told him I would be there.
I woke up early and got ready, putting on the one nice outfit I had brought to Haiti. But with the sweltering October heat and humidity, I was sweating immediately. Josh, who was on his one-month see-where-God-is-directing visit, drove me the two hours in a borrowed truck through the organized chaos of the capital until we reached the national palace compound in Port-au-Prince.
I stared up at the palace. Once white, gleaming, and beautiful like an ornate wedding cake, it was now crooked and crumbled, completely destroyed in the 2010 earthquake. We were directed to a huge tentlike structure that now housed the government of Haiti. While in line at security, I recognized a few familiar faces from the participants of the sting, realizing I was not the only one who had been summoned. After going through security, I had a moment to make a quick cell phone call. I called some of my advisors in Haiti, who urged me not to tell my story in front of anyone unless they were on the president’s staff.
As Josh and I sat waiting for my appointment, I began to worry about what was happening behind the scenes. Am I in danger? Is this some kind of set-up? My chair was positioned next to a large green plant, and all I could see of the person sitting on the other side were two feet. I thought I might know her—oddly enough her shoes looked familiar—but I couldn’t tell for sure. I decided to take a walk to the bathroom so I could get a better look at her face. I walked by and immediately recognized her from the numerous orphanage meetings; she had always resisted us pushing for action.
My heart started hammering. When I returned, the woman and I were both called in. She stood up and walked with a swagger straight to the office. I followed quickly, rehearsing what I was planning to say. Inside the office, the woman sat down in a chair facing the man behind the desk. I stood in the doorway, looked at the same man, and said in English, “I am willing to talk to you, but only if I am alone and no one else is in the room.” Without waiting for a response, I wheeled around and went back to sit in the waiting room.
I texted the people involved, hoping for some sort of direction on how to handle this situation, when I received a text from an unknown phone number, reading, “The first lady knows you are here. She is coming to talk with you.”
Wait, what? Who is this from, and how do they know who I am? Before I had any more time to think about it, or to talk to Josh, a tall woman in a smart business suit and pumps walked straight up to me and asked, “Are you Megan?”
I nodded. She pointed at me and told me to follow her. I stood up. Josh stood up, too, ready to go along with me. The lady pointed at him and then shook her finger in a quick, sharp, dismissive gesture, stating calmly, “She’ll be right back.” Josh got the message and sat back down. I shot him an anxious look, then followed her down the hall, my heart beating out of my chest.
She pointed to an office, where a poised and confident woman was sitting. I squinted my eyes a bit, trying to remember where I knew her from, and then I realized she was the first lady of Haiti, Sophia Martelly. Her words were clear and measured as she explained that she and others were well aware of the orphanage, and now the petition, and they were working on the problem.
I reached into my reservoir of boldness once again and said a quick prayer. Then I looked at her and began the short monologue I had prepared.
“I love Haiti. I love the people here. I love what I do. But right now people are chomping at the bit to hear about the bad that is happening here. They are waiting on me to give them the dirty, ugly, evil details of what has happened. But I don’t want to do that. I want Haiti to make the right choice in this. And I have to tell you, if this orphanage is not closed immediately, not only is it not the right choice, it will open the floodgates for bad media coverage. And we both know Haiti does not need more of that.”
I paused and took a long breath, probably the first in my whole statement.
Mrs. Martelly nodded thoughtfully. “We will do this as fast as we can,” she said, further explaining some of the details of the plan. She shook my hand, then told me to get myself out of there as fast as I could and warned me not to talk to anyone else about this. Her eyes stared into mine, and her mouth was set in a straight line.
At her words I felt threatened; confusion and fear rose up inside. You mean I’m not safe here in the national palace of Haiti, with the first lady watching out for me? I couldn’t understand, but I believed her. I said a quick thank you, then grabbing Josh’s hand on the way out, practically ran out of the building.
Later that day I got a call with more information about the timing of the orphanage closing and how it would all work. It sounded like a well-organized plan, and I prayed the boys and girls would be safe.
Our team had researched good orphanages for the children to relocate to after the closing, so I felt optimistic that this nightmare would soon end, at least for some children. The next day at midmorning I received phone calls alerting me that the orphanage had indeed been shut down. No longer would Son of God Orphanage use at-risk children to extort
money and goods from well-meaning foreigners. I felt good about that. Relieved.
But there was some bad news as well. Instead of finding a hundred children, they found only about fifty. Stories began to trickle out about children running away, supposedly returning to extended family or finding other people to live with.
Although I received numerous requests for interviews, I was worried about what this kind of exposure might do to my organization, my life here in Gressier, and, most important, my girls, Micha and Jessica, who were staying with my friend Tachi. So I declined them all. Others did speak up and give interviews; ironically some of them were not even involved in the process. Others had actually perpetuated the abuse of these children by constantly bringing American churches and groups to come and “tour” the orphanage when it was opened.
After the orphanage closed, I began to receive e-mails from hundreds of churches who had partnered with other “bad” Haitian orphanages. These e-mails included disturbing reports of abuse, rape, and other horrors. The list of corrupt orphanages grew by the week as the light of truth found its way into Haiti’s darkest and most desperate corners.
Son of God Orphanage had been a place filled with suffocating darkness, but the darkness did not win. The light won. Not only did the closing of Son of God Orphanage bring freedom; it brought to light what had long been hidden in the darkness: corruption, abuse, and evil. God was at work. In the following three months, more than twenty-five corrupt orphanages were closed.
My involvement, from my very first days in Haiti, caused me to rethink the common practice of American groups coming in and building, or supporting, orphanages without truly understanding the situation in Haiti. Especially since the plague of unemployment is so huge that it is believed 80 percent of all orphans end up in orphanages as a result of poverty. These “poverty orphans” are brought to orphanages mostly because their parents are unable to pay for food and school. Normally, American orphanages, or American-supported orphanages, pay for schooling for the children as well as for food, so to struggling parents these institutions look like the best and only option. However, with as many as 80 percent of orphans having a living parent, the rage to come to Haiti and build orphanages for these children seemed both broken and incongruous.
I realized that often what America thinks is the best for children is sometimes just a quick fix, a temporary Band-Aid that may ultimately exacerbate the situation. I knew there had to be a better way.
SEVENTEEN
School’s In!
Education is the key to unlock the golden door of freedom.
—George Washington Carver
I watched the children in their crisp new school uniforms line up in front of the dilapidated church. Two hundred students were about to make the walk from the old school we’d built, up to the beautiful new building on Bellevue Mountain. I held back tears as I remembered how we had prayed over and reclaimed the land used for voodoo ceremonies for many generations and battled to build the school from that very first moment when a voodoo priest had ordered us to stop putting in the fence around the property.
On impulse I looked down at my watch to see the time. As usual, we were running fashionably late. But my heart skipped a beat when the calendar date caught my eye. January 9, 2012. It was exactly one year to the day since I’d stepped off the plane in Port-au-Prince, wide-eyed, alone, terrified, and wondering if I’d made the biggest, scariest mistake of my life.
Now, lined up with the students in their light blue shirts and navy pants and skirts, the girls with their hair in pigtails tied with blue ribbons, I realized nothing had been a mistake at all. I looked at the kids’ matching book sacks, heard their giggles, and felt excitement in the air. These are children of the King, I thought. I could almost hear God saying, with a big smile, “These are My children.”
As we began to head uphill, Josh and I caught eyes briefly. I smiled shyly as I thought about the past few months, when he decided to quit his job at OtterBox and move full time to Haiti. After his boss had encouraged him to come spend a month here, we realized quickly that this was something we both wanted to continue.
Our dates consisted of getting gas together at the local gas station or going out to eat at Kayimit, the only restaurant in Gressier. There just are not many romantic spots for a couple to start a new relationship around Gressier; however, we knew when we started our relationship that dating in Haiti would be difficult. But we were both very committed to the fact that God had set this relationship up and He’d set it up in Haiti.
We began the uphill trek to Bellevue Mountain, the kids holding hands and marching two by two. As we walked, people along the way smiled and clapped. I could hardly contain my excitement, knowing the students had spent the first three months of the school year squished into a one-room church or under plastic tarps stretched overhead. Up on the mountain, things were going to be different.
After a fifteen-minute walk we arrived at the top. I could no longer hold back the tears. Just eight months earlier, I had known God wanted me to build a school. In obedience and faith, I’d built a tiny two-room school behind the church. That is all I can do, God, I remember thinking. That is all the money I have. That is the biggest I can get.
But I was wrong. And as I looked around the top of the mountain, my eyes widened in disbelief at the beautiful new school building with six classrooms.
Inside, the classrooms were light and airy, a soaring ceiling overhead with a white metal framework holding up the roof and letting light and air in through the eaves. The walls were a buttery yellow. And the smooth concrete floors were covered with neat wooden desks and benches.
Outside there was plenty of room to run, laugh, and play soccer on the grassy fields. And when it got hot, the tamarind tree offered a refuge of rest in its shade. At the edge of the mountaintop, we could see the Caribbean sparkling below, and behind were the deep green mountains looking over Bellevue.
I heard cheers of joy and excitement from the kids and the teachers, but before they scattered to their assigned classrooms, Mr. Gracia, the director of the primary grades, addressed the students. He began to talk about how big God is and how He made this happen. When he finished, Mr. Colin, another one of our directors, came up to pray over the students. He spread his arms wide, as if offering shelter, and thanked God for this beautiful new school on Bellevue Mountain, and the wonderful things ahead for the staff and the students. Many lifted their hands and voices to rejoice with him.
While Mr. Colin prayed, I looked around. Parts of the building weren’t quite finished, and I saw plywood, building material scraps, and even a few nails lying around. My mama’s heart lurched as I worried that the building wasn’t quite ready for children yet. Then my spirit calmed as I chuckled and thought about the open manholes all over the city, the cars that drove so crazily our school crossing guard had almost been hit numerous times as he tried to do his job, and the other hazards the children faced every single day. I exhaled as the prayer finished, and I knew we were going to be okay.
The school staff looked at me to say something, but I was speechless, so I looked over and nodded at Kyle, our construction supervisor. Kyle had poured his heart and his soul into the construction of this first building. While he both taught American construction techniques and learned the Haitian culture of building, he never settled for anything below his high standard, yet he was patient. Kyle was a wizard at finding Haitian material and prided himself on using local labor in Gressier.
Kyle took my cue and walked up to say a few words. He moved slowly, and I could tell he was choked with emotion at the dream-become-reality, which he’d been a huge part of. He stood for a minute, and Bernard moved up to stand beside him and translate.
“This is your school,” Kyle said to the children. “Your parents, your family, your community has built it for you. And we believe, we hope, that Respire Haiti Christian School will last for many years to come so that your kids can come here too.” As he smiled and nodded his head, s
tepping back, the kids clapped and smiled too.
As Kyle and Bernard stepped away, I took their place. Seeing hundreds of children in uniforms was a beautiful sight. After all of the public expressions of thanks to God and to Respire and to me, I knew all I needed to say was one thing: “God is moving on Bellevue Mountain. He has built this school for you. It is God who has done all of this. He is bringing His light here.”
The kids cheered, clapped, and then left in a big hurry to get into their classrooms for the very first time. As I walked under the walkway, peeking into classrooms, I looked at the scripture painted in beautiful script on the walls in each room. I saw the faces of the kids we’d been fighting to enroll in school, some for the first time in their lives. And trying to see through my clouded, tear-filled eyes, I saw story after story of redemption and beauty, sitting on new wooden benches on a smooth concrete floor.
I learned quickly that God’s vision is bigger than mine, and I’m learning He knows the children of Gressier much better than I do. He is working out the details and He reminds me of this constantly.
One day I was picking up Michaëlle and Jessica from the new school when I ran into one of my neighbors who was picking up his three children. As we all walked home together, the kids ran ahead while we talked. This father began pouring out his heart, saying he’d had his children enrolled in another school before the earthquake. But when the earthquake struck, he lost his house and his job, and the school fees rose to the point where he had to take his kids out of school.
He looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, “Without you, without this school, my children would be at home. My children would not be learning. I thank God for you every day.” He stopped to wipe his eyes. “Please know that we are with you. God bless you,” he finished.
Miracle on Voodoo Mountain Page 12
