How Could You? Hall of Shame-Settlement Home for Children, Juan Lozano Ortega, Edgar Geraldo Guzman Perez, Donald Ray Lewis UPDATED

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

From Austin, Texas, a group foster home, Settlement Home for Children, is under investigation by  the Residential Child Care Licensing due to a 13-year-old girl running away and being gang-raped.

“According to arrest warrant affidavits released Thursday, Juan Lozano Ortega, 34, and 36-year-old Edgar Geraldo Guzman Perez saw the girl walking near Peyton Gin Road and Galewood Drive on the night of June 29. She had left the Settlement Home for Children not long before that, the document said.

The two men and another man offered the girl a ride and took her to the apartment they shared off Rundberg Lane. Several other men were at the apartment at the time, according to the affidavit.

The affidavit said Ortega and Perez sexually assaulted the girl while others took cell phone video. Then the other men sexually assaulted her, the document said.

The men later took the girl and dropped her off in a place she was unfamiliar with, according to the affidavit. She asked if she could borrow a phone to call for help. Ortega obliged, the affidavit said. His number was captured by caller ID.

After the girl made it back to the Settlement Home, she reported what had happened. Police used the number captured by caller ID and the girl’s recollection of events as leads to find Ortega and Perez.

Bail for both men was set at $300,000. They are being held on an Immigration and Naturalization Service detainer.

Meanwhile, the Texas Department of Family Protective Services said Thursday that it is investigating how the 13-year-old left Settlement Home.

According the department’s website, Settlement Home was found deficient on seven items during inspections since 2011. Among the deficiencies found were failure to report a suicide attempt until three weeks after it happened, failure to immediately report that one of its children was arrested and failure to dispose of expired medications.

KXAN reached out to Settlement Home Residental Treatment Center Director Michael Downing. He did not want to respond to questions regarding the supervisory or security arrangements in place to watch the children in his care or how many reside at the campus.

A spokesperson at the Texas Department of Family Protective Services , familiar with Settlement House told KXAN the facility does not necessarily lock down its clients. There are some older than 18 who live in apartments on the facility’s 10-acre campus and are free to come and go, said Julie Moody.

Austin Police reports show 80 calls for runaways at Settlement Home since 2010:

• 2010: 20
• 2011: 44
• 2013: 16 thus far

There are also other children’s group homes that provide a more intimate environment. But the goal is the same – to offer lost, abandoned or parent-less kids a second chance.

The Executive Director of the Central Texas Children’s Home in Buda says his goal is to provide a loving environment where no child wants to run away. If they do take off, then return he says he is always forgiving.

“We hug them first of all and tell them we’re glad they’re safe. We want to tell them it’s not the right way to respond to life when it gets tough,” said Hagan who has been working with lost, abandoned or parentless children for 22 years.

“It takes a special kind of person to live in that house 24 hours a day, give them the love and attention they need,” he said.

Hagan says at his home, he works with his front line staff so they understand the signals from a child planning to run away. And how to intervene before that happens.

“When it does happen we have to make sure we do the proper reporting to the state,” he said. “We make sure we do the proper training with our staff before it happens and if it does happen (ask ourselves) what do we learn from this so it doesn’t happen again.”

Girl, 13, raped; foster facility probed

[KXAN 7/18/13 by Robert Maxwell and John Mortiz]
“A 13-year-old girl from Austin, Texas, was raped as a group of as many as 10 men who filmed the attack on cell phone cameras, cheering as they assaulted the girl.

The alleged assault took place in the city of Austin, court records released Thursday showed. The 13-year-old girl had run away from a group home at the end of June and hitched a ride with three strangers. The men then took her to the Avalon Palms apartment complex, where they raped her.

The two men were later joined by a group of 10 men, who filmed the assault with cell phones and took turns assaulting her, the arrest affidavit showed. The alleged rape lasted from 10 pm through the night and into the next morning, police said.

A medical team examined the young girl, finding that her wounds were consistent with the attack she described.

After the 13-year-old was gang raped by the group of 10 men, the girl claims the men dumped her off on the side of the road.

Police were able to track down the men thanks to a blunder on their part. After dropping the girl off, they let her borrow a cell phone to “find someplace to go.” She called her foster brother, who would not pick her up, but police were later able to use the caller ID number to find the suspects.”

“There was no word on the wherabouts of the other men involved in assaulting the 13-year-old girl, but police said they were searching for them.”

13-Year-Old Runaway Girl Gang Raped As Group Of 10 Men Film Assault

[The Inquisitr 7/19/13]

REFORM Puzzle Piece

Update: “Police have arrested a third man accused of raping a 13-year-old girl who ran away from a foster home in North Austin.

The girl told police she ran away from Settlement Home on June 29 and accepted a ride from three men who took her to the Avalon Palms Apartments.

There, police say she was raped by as many as 10 men who filmed the attack with their cell phones.

After the girl left that apartment complex, she met a woman on the street. The girl went with the woman to the Lantana Trace apartment complex where she and the woman smoked crack, police said.

That’s where police say Donald Ray Lewis then assaulted the girl. He’s charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child.

If convicted, he could be sentenced to five to 99 years in prison.

Two other men already face charges in the previous incident.”

Third man charged in rape of 13-year-old girl

[YNN 7/23/13]

Update 2: “Donald Ray Lewis,50, “has been found guilty of one count of aggravated sexual assault and one count of indecency with a child by contact after jurors found he raped a 13-year-old girl who ran away from a North Austin group home nearly two years ago.”

“The Travis County jury deliberated less than 45 minutes before rendering its verdict against Donald Ray Lewis, who faces up to life in prison due to his criminal record. The sentencing phase of his trial begins at 9 a.m. Thursday.

In court this week, prosecutors said they had a key eyewitness and a multitude of forensic evidence to prove Lewis was among the men who assaulted the teen in June 2013 after she fled from the Settlement Home for Children in the Rundberg area.

Testimony revealed new details in the case that has largely been handled behind closed doors through plea agreements, as social workers and police delved into the complexities of treating such vulnerable teens.

The teen has since escaped from another group home in Fort Worth and did not take the stand. The American-Statesman does not publish the names of sexual assault victims.

Witnesses said the girl had been sexually abused and shuffled in and out of foster homes and shelters since she was 7. She had behavioral issues and psychiatric needs that her adoptive parents did not know how handle.

Lewis, 50, had initially been charged with five counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child and two counts of indecency with a child by contact.”

Man guilty in assault of teen who fled North Austin group home[Statesman 4/29/15]

“A man has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for raping a 13-year-old girl who ran away from a North Austin group home nearly two years ago.”

“Travis County jurors deliberated about an hour Thursday before doling him a 40-year prison sentence on the first charge and a punishment of 25 years incarceration on the latter. Retired Judge Wilford Flowers, sitting in for Judge Cliff Brown, accepted their recommendation and ordered that Lewis serve the time concurrently.”

“In court this week, prosecutors said they had a key eyewitness and a multitude of forensic evidence to prove Lewis was among the men who assaulted the teen in June 2013 after she fled from the Settlement Home for Children in the Rundberg area.”

Man gets 40 years prison for assault of teen who fled group home[Statesman 4/30/15]