PHOENIX — A worker at a nonprofit organization that houses immigrant children separated from their parents at the border has been booked on suspicion of molesting a 14-year-old girl at its one of its facilities in Phoenix, police said Wednesday.
Southwest Key, which operates the facility, declined to say whether the 14-year-old girl was an immigrant who was separated from her parents at the border.
Fernando Magaz Negrete kissed and fondled the girl in her bedroom at the facility on June 27 in an encounter witnessed by the girl’s 16-year-old roommate, police said. They said surveillance video shows Magaz Negrete, 32, approaching the bedroom several times throughout the night, though the bedroom itself was outside the camera’s view.
“When a child tells us of inappropriate behavior, we immediately call law enforcement and start an internal investigation as appropriate,” Southwest Key spokesman Jeff Eller said. “That’s what happened in this case. Southwest Key always works with law enforcement to bring the full force of the law to bear when it is warranted.”
The nonprofit said it has fired Magaz Negrete.
Magaz Negrete was booked Tuesday on suspicion of child molestation, sexual abuse and aggravated assault. Bond was set at $150,000.
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