[Vision2020] Boarding Schools
Greg Burton
gburton@sltrib.com
Wed, 09 Apr 2003 15:56:31 -0600
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I have investigated, written and edited stories about Cross Creek and
the network of troubled teen centers associated with the home. Like this
list, the supporters are every bit as passionate as the detractors.
State officials have stepped in from time to time to shut poorly managed
facilities down and abuse is often alleged.
The problem I have seen with regulating any of them is that the
parents sign off on the treatment. Most states support parental rights.
And, if the parents say its OK, its OK with the states. In California,
not too long ago, a grandparent sued a son or daughter for sending a
grandchild to one of these Utah-based treatment homes despite the
grandchild's objections. The court found in favor of the parents.
My take?
If you send a 16 year old (or 15 year old) away until they are 18 and
they come back a better person is it because of the treatment or because
they are two years older?
If you care, one of my old stories is below, good luck
MOTHER SUES UTAH-BASED BUSINES ... 05/12/1999
The Salt Lake Tribune
Section: Utah
Date: 05/12/1999
Page: D2
Keywords: UT; Lawsuits; Businesses; Carribean; Youth
Mother Sues Utah-Based Business Treating Teens in Jamaica
Texan says sons were abducted against her will and subjected to
cultish
regimen and filthy conditions in the Caribbean
Byline: BY GREG BURTON THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
A Houston woman has filed a lawsuit against a Utah-based
treatment business for troubled teen-agers, claiming her
two sons were abducted against her will and subjected to
cultish behavior modification at a poorly managed facility in
Jamaica.
Donna Burke was divorced from her husband when, without her
consent, the husband allegedly paid Utah's Teen
Help to arrange the "kidnapping" of sons David, then 16, and
Scott Burke, then 14. The boys briefly stayed in Utah,
then were sent to affiliated residential program Tranquility
Bay in Jamaica.
At the time, the boys were living with their mother.
"Donna was frantic that her son Scott [and later David] had
suddenly disappeared from school and was nowhere to
be found," according to the lawsuit, filed Monday in U.S.
District Court. "When she finally discovered that he had
been taken out of the country to Jamaica, she tried by
telephone to contact him, but was told by defendants, both in
Utah and Jamaica, that she would not be allowed any contact."
Subsequent letters to her sons, she claims, were never
delivered.
Burke seeks damages for negligence, negligent child abuse,
false imprisonment, intentional and negligent infliction of
emotional distress and breach of fiduciary duty.
Teen Help, the program Burke has sued, is named in at least
two other other cases filed in U.S. District Court for
Utah. Thomas M. Burton, a Pleasanton, Calif., attorney who
filed the cases, likens the southern Utah network of
programs that includes Teen Help to a "cult."
Cross Creek Manor, a Washington County, Utah, home to which
Teen Help refers troubled teen-age girls, "is one
of many closed, secret cult centers . . . where adolescents are
impounded, tortured, berated, brainwashed, and
otherwise abused," he alleges in a Utah federal suit filed on
behalf of daughter Celece and mother Ceta Dochterman of
California.
In that lawsuit, Celece claims she was forced to urinate,
defecate and bathe while being watched; she was called a
"slut" and "family destroyer"; and paraded naked in front of
male staff.
Burke's lawsuit, also handled by Burton, alleges similar
outrageous treatment.
Unbeknown to Burke, her husband had received a court order
allowing the forced enrollment of Scott in the teen
program. Scott Burke, the suit claims, was experimenting with
marijuana, but David, who Burke claims was totally
without need of treatment, also was forced into the program by
her husband.
"As if these two fine young men had not suffered enough,
defendants began to heap upon them the most sadistic and
unwarranted physical and psychological abuse," Burke claims.
"Defendants subjected them to a steaming squalid jungle camp
infested with flies, mosquitoes, scorpions and
vermin," the lawsuit claims. "The food was primitive, filthy
and meager. The so-called case workers were untrained,
unlettered, and uncredentialed natives. Hygiene consisted of
bathing by garden hose without soap."
Burke, who raised her own money to fly to Jamaica in a
futile attempt to take her boys out of the program, was
rebuffed by directors at Tranquility Bay, she claims. "The boys
slept on mattresses with no sheets with no protection
from the swarms of insects. They were covered by bites."
When Burke's children were released from Tranquility Bay in
late 1998, they were "afraid, haunted by nightmares,
subject to panic attacks," and refused "to go anywhere near a
beach," the lawsuit alleges. "They never voice an opinion
on their own, fearful that it might not find approval."
Along with Teen Help, Burke seeks damages from a network of
businesses and people the lawsuit claims are
business associates, including Tranquility Bay, The Caribbean
Center for Change, Worldwide Association of Specialty
Programs, Brightway Hospital, Resource Realizations, R&B
Billing, Dixie Contract Services, Teen Escort Services,
Key Kay, Robert B. Lichfield, Karr Farnsworth, Brent M. Facer,
Jay Kay, Jean Davis, Lorraine Black, Delbert Goates
and David Gilcrease.
Lichfield started his multimillion-dollar Teen Help empire
in 1987. "The programs are very effective, but you're not
going to please everybody, you're not going to please every
parent," he said during an interview last year. He was not
immediately available on Tuesday for comment.
Some of the defendants were involved with Brightway, a
southern Utah adolescent hospital Utah officials accused of
operating as a front for the network of teen homes. Last year,
Brightway was forced to close its doors under pressure
from the Utah Department of Health's bureau of licensing.
Scott Dredge wrote:
> Visionaries,
>
> I have a 15 year old sister who was placed in a
> boarding school called Cross Creek Manor in Southern
> Utah in early March. According to one of the members
> of their admission staff, Cross Creek's program
> specializizes in behavior modification and teens are
> awarded points for good behavior which allows them to
> gain priveleges. She is not allowed phone calls or
> visitors. Without being able to communicate with her,
> I have no idea how she's doing. As a little bit of
> background, we shared the same father until his death
> in January. Her mother is an extremely religious
> woman and the mother/daughter relationship had become
> strained over the past couple of years over things
> such as the kind of music my sister listened to and
> the kinds of clothes she wore. In any event, my sister
> is in this place and everyone I've talked with has
> told me that I just need to accept it and there is
> nothing I can do about it and she'll be able to leave
> in 3 years when she turns 18.
>
> Does anyone out in vision2020 land have any
> information on places like these? If so, please email
> me offline. I'm fine with trying to work within the
> rules of the Cross Creek system to support my sister
> with her program, but I'm having a heck of time even
> getting any information on what the rules are. The
> internet isn't much help on this one...stories range
> from great results to absolute horror.
>
> Thanks,
>
> -Scott
>
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