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The general director of of Mexico's Social Security Institute, Daniel Karam, has accepted and announced investigative findings confirming irregularities in the management of ABC daycare in Hermosillo, Sonora.
Karam clarified when he arrived to the posistion in Hermosillo, he was given the dictamin from the Municipial civil protection agency, which established, after inspection, ABC daycare did, in fact, pass all safety standards; however:
Now we have very clear elements, showing us there is an enormous difference in what this inspection document states and reality.
According to additional investigative findings, Mexico's Attorney General, Eduardo Medina Mora, announced eveidences were found that in 2005, daycare employees and management were advised of gross insufficiancies and irregularities in the daycare's safety structures.
The investigation will now focus on why these irregularities were not corrected in the moment, stating the responsibility of this gross act of neglect falls not only on federal inspectors, but also on the daycare's private owners.
With the new evidence in hand, Medina Mora announced three additional Social Security officials have been suspended pending investigation and mentioned the new information found could very probably change pending criminal responsibility to charges which would not be eligible for bail.
Mexico suspended three Social Security Institute officials Friday pending investigations into whether negligence played a role in a fire that killed 45 children at a day care center.The 45th victim died at a hospital Friday, a week after the blaze erupted in the northern Sonora state capital of Hermosillo, state Health Secretary Raymundo Lopez said.
Twenty-one children and three adults remain hospitalized, including five children who have been sent to Shriners Hospitals for Children-Northern California in Sacramento. Lopez said two more children would be sent to U.S. hospitals over the weekend, one to Sacramento and another to Cincinnati, Ohio.
The Social Security Institute, which outsourced services to the privately run day care, said it suspended three officials: Noemi Lopez, the Sonora state day care center coordinator; Delia Botello, the Hermosillo city day care coordinator, and Emigdio Martinez, the Sonora chief of economic and social benefits.
The institute's top delegate in Sonora, Arturo Leyva, was asked to step down earlier this week. Two state government officials whose wives own the day care have also resigned.
-AP
Officials say the fire started at an adjacent locked and unoccupied warehouse and may have been caused by a short circuit or overheating in the building's air conditioning system. The fire spread to the day care center's roof, sending fire raining on the children and teachers before collapsing upon them.
The day care center passed a safety inspection on May 26, and its owners and inspectors have said there were three clearly marked emergency exits, but firefighters, parents and volunteers fought to evacuate the children through the only door that was not blocked and or locked and through large holes that a neighbors had opened by running his truck into the cinderblock wall.
In an additional note, the general director of Social Security announced an initial $64.3 million pesos in economic support will be paid to the families of of injured and deceased children.
In his press conference, Director Karam stated $155,900 m.n. would be paid to each family of deceased children in addition to all funeral costs. Families of hospitalized children, will recieve a cash payment of $234,000 m.n. in addition to all medical, rehabilitation, and any additional living expenses incurred during said treatments.
