Save the Children has admitted to major failings in its employment procedures after it emerged that a senior official worked at the charity for more than two decades before he was fired over historical child safeguarding concerns.

Rudolph von Bernuth, who held senior posts including that of international programmes director, was at Save the Children from 1992-96 and 1997-2014 before he was sacked for serious misconduct linked to past behaviour. He has since been a university guest lecturer in the US.

Save the Children said that the allegations concerned Von Bernuth’s behaviour before and during his employment by the charity, but would not give any details of the specific complaints that led to his departure other than to say “serious concerns were raised about him”.

The UK Charity Commission told the Guardian that his dismissal was linked to “historic child safeguarding concerns”.

Save the Children also said that as a result of the case it would investigate how it dealt with claims of sexual misconduct and harassment. However, it would not clarify whether there were allegations of this nature made against Von Bernuth.

The charity said it was “appalled at and denounce his behaviour prior to and during his employment”, adding: “We are heartbroken at the pain he caused.”

Save the Children admitted it was “deeply concerned” at how it handled hiring procedures, but would not say whether it had asked for a reference before hiring Von Bernuth.



The Guardian asked Save the Children to elaborate on any knowledge of wrongdoing in other jobs but the charity refused.

Von Bernuth did not respond to repeated attempts to contact him for comment.

The revelations add to significant problems for the charity, with staff demanding the removal of Sir Alan Parker as its international chairman over complaints of inappropriate behaviour by former executives. They believe he should step down because of failures to deal with the complaints from staff against the charity’s former chief executive, Justin Forsyth, and the former policy director Brendan Cox, the widower of murdered MP Jo Cox.

Based on how Von Bernuth’s employment was handled, the charity said it would order a review of all prior investigations, adding that there would be a thorough inspection of how it looks at claims of sexual misconduct.

In a statement, the US arm of the charity said that “in an effort to take a fresh look at these issues” it had asked the former chairman of the US securities and exchange commission, Mary Jo White, to investigate. It said the investigation would look at “the organisation’s current procedures for hiring and related employment practices and for addressing claims of sexual misconduct and harassment”.

Von Bernuth worked for Care International for two decades before joining Save the Children, where he was most recently the international programme director based in London.

Care International told the Guardian that Von Bernuth resigned in May 1992 and that it had no records of formal sexual misconduct complaints. “More than 25 years have passed, and our records don’t indicate whether or not a reference was given [to Save the Children] at that time,” it said.

Von Bernuth is understood to have worked in the London office on secondment from the US branch of the charity and to have left suddenly in 2014. One former staff member who asked to remain anonymous said: “When he left, no one was told anything. He just ... disappeared.”

His case was reported to the UK Charity Commission and he was not provided with a reference upon leaving. He was investigated, with details passed on to authorities in the US and the UK.

A spokesperson for the Charity Commission said: “Our records from 2014 indicate that the charity Save the Children International made a serious incident report to us in March 2014, relating to a staff member and historic child safeguarding concerns ... we established that the individual in question was suspended and later had his employment terminated by the charity.”

Since 2016, Von Bernuth has been the president of the board of directors for Hospice and Palliative Care of Oneida, Herkimer and Madison counties, New York. He has also been a guest lecturer on humanitarian issues at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School. Neither organisation responded to requests for comment.



His public profile also says that he retired from Save the Children in 2015 and that the Canterbury School, a boarding and day school he attended in Connecticut, awarded him a distinguished alumni award last year.

Save the Children is one of a number of charities to be affected by a crisis that has swept the sector since Oxfam staff were accused of sexual misconduct in Haiti in 2011. Last week, the heads of 22 aid organisations took the unprecedented step of apologising for the sector’s failure to tackle sexual abuse. They vowed to toughen safeguards against misconduct.

The letter, signed by the heads of ActionAid UK, Christian Aid, Cafod, Care International UK, as well as Oxfam, Save the Children and others, said: “We are truly sorry.”