NEW MEXICO
Associated Press
BY RUSSELL CONTRERAS AND MORGAN LEE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Authorities investigating a paramilitary Christian sect for child sexual abuse say they looking into whether the New Mexico group brought children into the country illegally. Former group members say leaders kept them and the children living at sect’s compound in “slavery.”
Cibola County Sheriff Tony Mace told The Associated Press Tuesday that investigators found numerous children during a Sunday raid of the armed Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps in remote Fence Lake.
Exactly where the children came from is unknown because the sect apparently kept members from reporting births to state officials, Mace said. A former sect member says the group illegally brought at least one child to the United States from one of its foreign missions, which according to its website were operated in Africa, India and the Philippines.
“The children were trained not to talk to law enforcement or to hide from law enforcement,” Mace said.
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