A Colorado man was sentenced Friday to 210 years in prison for sexually abusing numerous children at the orphanage he founded and directed in Haiti, officials stated.
According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Michael Karl Geilenfeld, 73, most recently of Littleton, founded St. Joseph’s Home for Boys — a home for orphaned, impoverished, and otherwise vulnerable children in Haiti — in 1985 and operated it for more than two decades.
During this time, Geilenfeld repeatedly traveled from the United States to Haiti, where he sexually abused the boys entrusted to his care.
He also physically and emotionally abused the children in the home, including through physical assault and other forms of punishment.
In February 2025, a federal jury convicted Geilenfeld of one count of traveling in foreign commerce for the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct and six counts of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place between 2005 and 2010.
Each of the six counts of engaging in illicit sexual conduct relates to a separate victim who was a child at the time of the offense.
At trial, these six victims testified about the sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of Geilenfeld and the devastating impact it had on them, as did other victims, now adults, who were not the subject of the charged offenses.
Victims and witnesses also described the physical abuse Geilenfeld inflicted on his victims and the manipulation that he employed to keep his operation running and financially supported by others.