At the moment of Nicholaus’ death, staff threw a bucket of water on him… They told him "It’s all in your head." When he didn’t respond, they took a closer look. He was dead.
"I had to stand facing a wall for three days, except for going to the bathroom, because I had dust on my chair. My muscles killed me for three weeks. But if you fall down, you'll be shot up with Thorazine or put in seclusion for being defiant. So you stand there, and you have nothing to do but think. I'd pretend I was riding through LA on a bus, and reciting streets in my head, or play chess in my head, or count backwards from 2,000 by sevens. Otherwise you'd go berserk.
Everyone got punished for one person's offenses. [Once] we had to scrub the gym floor with a toothbrush 12-hours a day for three weeks because one girl wanted to run away."
Lyn Duff, whose account was published in Sassy magazine (June 1994), was committed by her parents to a private, for-profit mental hospital. She was sent there after her mother read her diary and found a love poem to another girl.
Four months before MK's death of a blood clot in her lungs, inspectors in Iowa cited numerous violations at "The Academy" a residential program for 162 troubled teenagers.
Violations at The Academy, noted the inspectors, included aggressive restraints. Most restraints, began with a minor incident, like a child's not putting on a coat. Many ended in injuries to the children, including broken blood vessels, black eyes, and bloody noses. Oklahoma inspectors visiting a resident from their state reported a 2 ½-hour restraint in which five male staff members held down a female resident, one lying across her hips.
In filing a report on M's death, state investigators concluded that "she was made to suffer greater distress than was reasonably necessary." She had been placed at the facility by the state because she was deemed to be "a child in need of assistance."
Because of her experience in lock-up, Rosebud Abigail Denovo became an activist and homeless youth. Shortly before her death, she wrote about her stay at CR. "I was committed at the age of 14 by my parents. I spent nine months there. I was not there because of any real illness; I was there because (basically) I did not get along with my parents and other authority figures.
"Isolation, which was supposed to be used when a person was an immediate danger to self or others, was used regularly as a punishment for refusing to follow staff orders. I was placed in isolation several times."
"Restraints and drugs were used similarly, although Rosebud herself was never drugged. Two years later she had two other experiences with mental hospitals which were worse.
"Many people who were committed to these institutions became almost like zombies, with their entire personalities changed," said Rosebud. "Others became suicidal. Those who emerged relatively psychologically normal were usually able to withstand the mental abuse by uniting with other teenagers there. Fortunately, I was strong enough to remain myself, but these experiences had a lasting, damaging effect on me."
(Rosebud Abigal Denovo’s report was carried by 24-7. The magazine noted that she was shot to death by the Berkeley police on August 25, l992.)
If teens escape the hell of a high security mental rehab institution, or the hell-fire of a religious behavior-changing boarding school or cult-like "emotional growth" facility, they might end up being sent by their parents to a boot camp, where physical exercise is used to punish a child.
Recently, there have been several high-profile cases of death of children at boot camps. When one teenage girl, Michelle Sutton died of dehydration, her mother Cathy Sutton set up a memorial fund for her daughter and has devoted her life to educating legislators and parents about the dangers of camps that abuse teens.
FOR SEVERAL WEEKS before he died on March 2, 1998, Nicholaus Contreraz, age 16, was suffering from diarrhea and continuous vomiting. For days before his death, he was then made to carry around a trash can containing his vomit and the clothes he had defecated in.
Hours before he died, he was required to stretch out in a "hold" position with his feet on a desk and his face over a bucket of his own vomit.
Moments before he died, he was put into a wheelbarrow and required to make the sounds of an "ambulance." He was being wheeled to a volleyball game and, because he could not stand, the staff "assisted" him in getting the ball over the net.
At the moment of Nicholaus’ death, staff threw a bucket of water on him.... They told him "it's all in your head." When he didn't respond, they took a closer look. He was dead.
An autopsy showed 2 1/2 quarts of pus in his partially collapsed left lung.
Abused children, whether privately incarcerated or in public facilities have no voice. Even when an event such as the death of a child occurs, they are afraid to tell what they know for fear of retribution. At the Arizona Boy's Camp, police department records show how hundreds of hours of onsite interviews failed to turn up anything more than suspicions... until finally the truth began to emerge. Children at the camp were afraid to tell the police how the staff tortured and humiliated Nicholas Contreraz until he died in agony.
Teens write about their experiences at 'troubled teen' camps - a MUST read!
An American GULAG : Secret P.O.W. Camps for Teens by Alexia Parks
In America, it’s open season on children. Children have become the cash crop for a rising industry of child abuse that targets anxious or worried parents of "defiant," "angry," "depressed," or "troubled" teens.
Over the past two years, Alexia Parks has become the "Dear Abby," to worried families and teen survivors of secret P.O.W. camps for teens. Her book, An American GULAG, describes her descent into a secret underworld of child abuse and what she found there.
No one is following these abused children back out into society. What kind of lives are left for them out in the "real" world? Scared to death, and back, they may constitute a sub-class of teens who may be unable to readjust to the "normal" world. Walking time bombs of suppressed rage and anger, they may explode when certain words or events trigger a flashback. This sub-class of teenagers who have had their behavior abruptly changed in violent ways has not been studied. They constitute a growing subculture that may be increasingly isolated in a world that is rushing headlong into the 21st Century.
After years of abuse, some GULAG-survivors suffer the added pain of disbelief and denial from others when they try to talk about what has happened to them. After an early draft of An American Gulag was posted on the Internet, I received the following e-mail:
I've only just started reading [your book], and the tears stream down my face. I know I won't be able to swallow it all in one sitting, but do plan to return for more chapters as I am ready. I survived one of those "schools."
Sometimes, I don't know what to do. I've lived in this horrible, shameful fear for the last ten years, and no-one ever seems to believe me. They laugh in my face when I say the word "brainwashing."
I know you'll believe me, and I know you won't laugh. I just wanted to thank you for that, and for giving a voice to those of us that were denied one.
No More Nightmares at Tranquility Bay?
What happened at a program called "The Straights", which was shut down
If your kid hates school, try to see it from their perspective
Isn't it funny how many programs are advertising that they can fix struggling, defiant teens? They say can fix ADD, ADHD, ODD, Learning Disabilities, Hyperactivity and everything else that could go "wrong" with a teen. Why are they so eager to help? BECAUSE THEY WANT YOUR MONEY! They will brainwash your teen into thinking they're insane and screwed up, and that they NEED or even DESERVE to be treated like dirt! That is the "success" these programs talk about - breaking a person down until they think they are worthless, and then brainwashing them into being "good". This "success" cannot last - eventually the person will snap. Don't do that to your child. It isn't worth it.
How has American society responded to the problems of today’s teens? Here is a sign of the times: An agency in Colorado recently changed its name from Child Services to Youth Corrections. In the final decade of the 20th Century, rehabilitation and prevention is out of political favor. Incarceration is "in."
Yes. It’s called mentoring. It is based on understanding and respect.
And it works.
For more info on mentoring, go here.