TEN members of a US Christian group may face charges of kidnapping minors and child-trafficking after trying to smuggle a group of children out of quake-hit Haiti.
Amid growing concern over the safety of hundreds of thousands of vulnerable women and children left destitute after the January 12 quake, the case could also go to trial in US courts.
Mazar Fortil, interim prosecutor for the main Port-au-Prince court, said the group may also face a lesser charge of criminal conspiracy.
But asked about earlier comments whether the group would be transferred to face charges in the US, Ms Fortil said it was "too early to tell."
The five men and five women with US passports, as well as two Haitians, were seized late Friday as they tried to cross into the neighboring Dominican Republic in a bus with 33 children aged between two months and 14 years.
They have defended their actions, saying they were only trying to do what was right in the aftermath of the 7.0-magnitude quake, but the arrests have again thrown the spotlight on the Caribbean nation's impoverished people.
The leader of the church group, Laura Silsby, denied any intention of illegal activity in an interview with CNN.
"We literally all gave up everything we had, you know, income, and used our own funds to come here and help these children," she said.
The Idaho church's Reverend Clint Henry, also speaking to CNN, said the group’s intentions were "upright and pure".
"It is certainly not our interest to traffic children ... we are simply trying to help," he said.
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