Colombia detains Lev Tahor sect members and takes 17 children into protective custody

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BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Immigration authorities in Colombia have taken 17 children into protective custody after they were rescued from an ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect whose members have been accused of sexually abusing and kidnapping minors in several countries.

Gloria Esperanza Arriero, the director of Colombia’s national immigration service, told The Associated Press on Monday that her agency is questioning nine members of the Lev Tahor sect after they were detained on Sunday during a hotel inspection.

“We will likely deport them,” Arriero said, “because there are no arrest orders for them in Colombia."

She said that the group of 17 children and nine adults arrived in Colombia during the last week of October, and were staying in a hotel in the small northwestern city of Yarumal while they searched for a rural property they could use to start up a new site in the South American country.

Arriero said that there were Interpol yellow notices for five children in the group, who have American and Guatemalan passports. The notices are global alerts issued for people who have been reported as missing, or are potential victims of parental, or criminal abduction.

The official said that her agency decided to act after residents informed police about the presence of members of the sect in Yarumal.

“The positive thing in all of this is that we got to the children before they had a compound,” Arriero said. “Because in that case, we would have required a search warrant.”

In Colombia, immigration officials can conduct searches in hotels and check whether foreigners staying there have entered the country legally, or are wanted by law enforcement agencies.

Last year police in Guatemala raided a Lev Tahor compound in the Central American country, following reports of sexual abuse, taking at least 160 minors and 40 women into protective custody.

The sect has run into legal problems elsewhere.

In 2022, Mexican authorities arrested a leader of the sect near the Guatemalan border and removed a number of women and children from their compound. In 2021, two leaders of the group were convicted of kidnapping and child sexual exploitation crimes in New York.

Lev Tahor is known to have members in Canada, the United States, Mexico, Guatemala and Israel.