Third person accused of child sex abuse at Barcelona school

Another employee of Col·legi Maristes Sants Les Corts, this time a dining room monitor, was arrested in December in relation to a complaint of alleged sexual abuse of five children, it emerged yesterday. The new complaint brings the total to three employees of the Maristes school in Barcelona to be reported and investigated for paedophilia: Joaquín Benítez, a confessed paedophile who currently has ten accusations against him, a teacher accused by a girl, and now the dining room monitor, who which has been accused by five children.

The school management is not known to have taken any judicial measure in any of the three cases, although last week it did release two statements explaining that since it became aware of the Benítez case it has put itself at the disposal of families and the justice system and dismissed the alleged aggressor. In the second statement the school claimed that in all cases the established protocols had been activated, while accepting that if there is the need to make changes to be more effective, it will.

In 2011, the Maristes school in Badalona had to deal with another child abuse scandal, involving Brother Lucio, who eventually avoided trial due to the length of time that had passed since the alleged abuse.