NY TIMES: Charges of Cruelty at a Jamaica Discipline Academy

[Anonymous]

Look, it doesn't matter whose country's flag is flying higher.  Of course the local countries' law should (in theory) control what goes on within their borders.   But in the view of WWASPs,  their programs are not even regulated within the United States,  let alone even by the State of UTah.  (See recent article in Deseret News,  Wednesday,  

All things considered,  the only flag the WWASPies should fly above their institutions is the skull and crossbones.

[Carey]

This is my thoughts on the reeling in that WWASP does and the parents who are taken in by it.

I can understand how desperate parents can make a desparate decision.  I can see how in the middle of a crisis parents can fall for a WWASP school especially given how they are sold (a paradise for change, etc).  What I can't understand is why after the crisis period is over, meaning after the kids have been placed in one of the programs and the parents are able to gather their thoughts, do they not start to dig a little deeper and require real concrete information on these places.  

So understandable, in a desparate situation one may make a desparate decision.  But after the dust settles, after placement, they should have, and for those whose kids are still in, should start looking into the schools more in depth.  I think parents are either in denial, I think they do not want ask questions, it is easier for them to just beleive in the "program",  or else, they just don't care.

What ever the reason, they are  accountable for the mistake they have made.  We as parents have a responsibilty.  That responsibilty includes knowing with out a doubt, proof positive, in your face, that your kids are being treated with dignity, respect and love.

[FaceKhan]

I think lazy and selfish might not be the right words to describe it but saying that it is just desperation seems like a way to exonerate parents for their mistakes.

Yes you were taken advantage of by professional con-artists, and yes it could happen to anyone. But there is certainly an element of being afraid of teenagers that has pervaded our society to the point where we think that any deviation from the plan that parents have for their kids is going to ruin their lives.

Its a cultural more than individual mentality that leads parents to these creeps but it is there all the same. Parents, both those who woke up and those who still believe say it was the hardest thing they ever had to do but that is just the 90's version of the great lie called "this is gonna hurt me more than it hurts you." Because if all the terrible things they say their kids were doing are true, then living through and seeking conventional help must be a lot harder than sending the kid away.

There are a lot more options available to parents than they think. A lot of them, far less harmful than a mindrape mill are often dismissed outright.

Different school
different kind of school (progressive, sudbury, montessori, trade school, homeschool, unschool)
regular boarding school (some kids just do better away from home)

If they are 17 they can join the military with parental consent, it used to happen a lot, at least the military builds a person back up while they are screaming at them.

Move out (no one was meant to live at home forever, some people need to leave sooner)

A Psychologist or Psychiatrist that the kid likes and will talk to. (unpopular because it takes time and parents often don't want to hear that they are part of the problem)

outpatient group therapy/drug treatment
(inpatient was never meant for people who are not totally addicted to hard drugs)
a trip somewhere (30k goes a long way, you could send your kid around the world three times for that.)




You were conned and it is not your fault but a mouse always finds a cat when they are looking for one and you went looking.

 I have a bank vault full of 100 dollar bills in Nigeria and I just need some help getting it out and you can have 3 million of it. Oh and as a goodwill gesture I need your kid who has some problems, his brothers, sisters, stepsisters, stepbrothers, and refer some of their friends too plus 30,000 per year per kid to cover expenses. It may take a few months for the paperwork to process and I must travel back in forth a bit to get it all worked out so don't be surprised if you don't hear from me for a while.  

It is always the kids whose parents are afraid of them making mistakes and often act as control freaks and criticize and micromanage every detail of their kids lives that end up with the problems later. Its the kids who were never allowed to set limits for themselves who don't learn how to set limits when they are on their own.

My parents never gave me a curfew, they said don't be home too late. They did not say anything much about drinking or drugs, they believed and reasonably so that I could decide for myself how much was too much or whether to try at all. They never gave me some speech about not having sex , they just said "be responsible".

Teens are almost univerally going to experiment with sex, drugs, hair, piercings, and clothing styles. For some experimentation does not seem worth the risks and they don't really do much. Many just dabble with a few things. But it is almost always the kids whose parents drive them crazy with rules and expectations and lectures and control that don't know when to say when.  

You are not gonna be able to protect your kids when they are adults in college and out in the world so its best to wean them off supervision before the well runs dry at 18.



[ This Message was edited by: FaceKhan on 2003-06-19 11:16 ]

[ This Message was edited by: FaceKhan on 2003-06-19 11:30 ]

[scottT]

Boarding schools go unchecked in Utah
By Toby Hayes
Deseret Morning News

      Utah has no regulatory power over boarding schools within its borders, parents and state officials are discovering following a crackdown on a Costa Rican boarding school with Utah ties.
      "There's no background check on any of those people," said Ken Stettler, director of licensing for the Utah Department of Health and Human Services. "What you get are untrained and unprepared staff who will dole out abuse because they don't know how to handle the kids."
      Even someone accused of aggravated sexual abuse is free to work with children in boarding schools.
      Wayne E. Winder was arrested and charged last year with one first-degree felony count of aggravated sexual abuse and three class A misdemeanors of child abuse while director of Majestic Ranch Academy. The boarding school is affiliated with World Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools Inc. of St. George, the same company under which Dundee Ranch Academy operated in Costa Rica.
      Majestic is a working 2,000 acre ranch and school for 10- to 14-year-olds. It sits northeast of Sage Creek Junction and borders Wyoming where the Bear River enters Utah.
      In March, Winder entered a plea in abeyance to the single felony count, aggravated sexual abuse, after the alleged victim recanted her story. If Winder stays out of trouble for the next nine months, his charges will be dropped, said his attorney, Earl Xaiz. Meanwhile, Winder has returned to the school as director.
      Following last year's investigation of Winder, Utah Assistant Attorney General Craig Barlow advised Majestic's owners they were operating without a proper license. But a closer look revealed Utah had no mechanism for licensing boarding schools.
      "They are claiming to be a boarding school, and Utah has no regulations for boarding schools," Stettler said. "(So) there is no requirement for them to have fire inspections or anything for life and safety."
      No one seems to know who regulates World Wide, either.
      The nonprofit corporation is classified by the Utah Department of Commerce as a grant-making and giving service that provides referrals to individually owned behavior modification facilities, many of which are owned by family members of the corporation's founders.
      Stettler says it doesn't fall under his jurisdiction because World Wide is an association and offers referrals only. And the Division of Consumer Protection doesn't regulate the group because the corporation assists treatment and behavior modification facilities, not secondary schools.
      World Wide, meanwhile, has faced allegations of child abuse by several foreign governments, including Costa Rica, Samoa, Mexico and the Czech Republic.
      But the corporation's Utah ties run deep, up and down the state. World Wide founder Bob Lichfield was a manager at Provo Canyon School in the early 1980s when child welfare officials investigated allegations of abuse at the school.
      "We had a report that there was abuse. And yes, there was," said former youth corrections investigator Wayne Holland. "They would drag kids by their hair into a dark room and keep them there for an extended period of time. At least a couple hours."
      Several managers, including Lichfield and Karr Farnsworth, left Provo Canyon to start their own schools. By 1988 the two had started Cross Creek Manor in LaVerkin. As Lichfield opened similar schools in places such as Jamaica, Samoa and Mexico, the need for a corporate umbrella became apparent.
      Lichfield teamed with his attorney, SkyWest Airlines founder J. Ralph Atkin, to establish the corporation in 1998. At the time of incorporation, World Wide was headquartered at the St. George law office of Atkin, who assumed the position of trustee along with Lichfield and Brent Facer. In April 1999 Atkin resigned his post as trustee after the Czech Republic shut down a reform school he owned there. School officials faced allegations of abuse in a raid similar to that in Costa Rica this spring.
      Last year Lichfield was the third leading Utah contributor to federal election campaigns and gave a combined $10,000 to three southern Utah representatives, according to state and federal campaign disclosures.
      "The Lichfields have been very generous to help contribute to the quality of life in our community," said Rep. David Clark, R-Washington County, who received $2,500 from Lichfield. "Bob Lichfield has had an interest in Republican values."
      Lichfield gave $175,000 to various federal campaign funds in the last two years, and his wife and children gave more than $40,000.
      Clark said the money Lichfield gave to his campaign has not influenced any of his decisions.



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E-mail: thayes@desnews.com

[MORSEGLASS]

WELL FIRST OF ALL, ILL BE THE FIRST TO ADMIT I MADE A HUGE MISTAKE, THE NEXT WHEN YOU HAVE A BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER AT THE AGE OF 13, DECIDES SHE DOESNT WANT TO GO TO SCHOOL (SHE WANTED TO BE HOME SCHOOLED AND THAT WAS NOT AN OPTION)ONE MONTH TO BECOMING 14, AND IN CALIFORNIA WE HAVE TUFF CHILDREN LAWS, AT THE AGE OF 14 THEY DONT HAVE TO REMAIN ANYWHERE THEY DONT WANT TO BE, THE LOCAL POLICE COULDNT EVEN THREATEN HER WITH JUVI, I BECAME DESPERATE.  THAT MY CHILD (IN LOVE WITH A BOY)  WOULD BE ONE OF THOSE CHILDREN PREGANT AT 14,  NO EDUCATION, NO WAY TO SUPPORT HER SELF. I WAS SINGLE MOM MOST OF HER LIFE AND HAVE WORKED MY ASS OFF TRYING TO GIVE HER WHAT SHE NEEDED AND WANTED, (NO CHILD SUPPORT) AND LIKE I SAID BEFORE IVE MADE MISTAKES, SHE WAS IN THERE 2 1/2 MONTHS, I REGRET EVERYDAY I SENT HER, AND IF FOR ONE MINUTE I THOUGHT SHE WAS HEADED DOWN THE ROAD TO BEING A LOSER (WHICH MY BROTHER IS, IM RAISING HIS CHILD ALSO. NOT TO NAME THE COUNTLESS FAMILY MEMBERS I HAVE THAT ARE LOSERS) I WOULD DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO MAKE SURE SHE WILL TURN OUT OK, NOT MEANING ANOTHER WWASP SCHOOL! IM NOT SAYING SHE WAS BAD. SHE WAS NEVER IN ANY TROUBLE WITH THE LAW, SHE JUST WANTED TO DO HER OWN THING, WHEN MY FAMILY WHICH IS HUGE SAT DOWN AND DISCUSSED THIS, I ASKED ANY OF THEM IF THEY CAN GUARNTEE ME SHE WILL GET THROUGH THIS ILL KEEP HER HERE, NO ONE SAID A WORD! MY UNCLE HEAVLY ENVOLED IN DRUGS WAS MURDERED, A CLOSE FRIEND OF MY FAMILY, WAS FOUND DEAD IN THE DELTA, RAPED AND STRANGLED A MONTH BEFORE I SENT HER,  WWASP PROMOTED AN EDUCATION, NOT WHAT SHE GOT, YOU HONESTLY THINK THAT "ALL" THE PARENTS KNEW WHAT WAS GOING ON, OR THAT THEY JUST SIMPLY DIDNT WANT TO DEAL WITH THEIR KIDS? I DONT FEEL SO, AND IF THAT WAS THE CASE THEN WHY ARE THESE PARENTS PULLING THEIR KIDS? WHY ISNT MY CHILD IN JAMAICA?  WHY ARE WE TRYING TO GET THE WORD OUT? TO REPORTERS TV SHOWS?  THE ANSWER SO OTHER PARENTS IN MY SHOES DONT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE WITH THEIR CHILDREN!  SHANNON

[MORSEGLASS]

oops sorry about the caps, i have to log on with them and i forget to turn them off, shannon

[FaceKhan]

You make a good point about why parents, especially in the last two years or so have been becoming more vocal and pulling their kids faster.

Perhaps the parents that they are recruiting these days are less apt to be duped and less apt to take it sitting down and less apt to not care.

Certainly this industry has been growing rapidly and expanding the marketing efforts and perhaps reaching more parents who unlike their earlier customers are not looking for the kind of program that WWASP runs.

I agree most WWASP parents don't know what they are signing their kids in for. But they still make themselves easy prey and fall for the quick and easy fix offered to them.

Even though most parents really are being duped there are definitely a large number of WWASP/Provo/CEDU parents out there who send their kid away simply to get rid of them or to punish them or to keep them from telling of abuse at home.

Two simple ways to kill this industry, make it a crime to hold a teen for treatment against their will without due process and secondly, make child abuse punishable by death. Call it murdering the future.

Is the death penalty a detterant to these creeps? I will be thinking about that when Lichfield and Kay are strapped to a gurney watching the poison crawl up the tube.

[MORSEGLASS]

well i cant answer to why everyone else choose the program, ive talked to a few others, i agree some dont see anything wrong with the progam, i know i was in shock when the embassy took my daughter aside and let her use their phone to contact me, by that time i already started coming across some things on the net, and had  her plane ticket, that was the day after the riot, but also when they come home they dont tell you everything right off, you start hearing more and more as the first few days go by, then you finally get the whole story, then youre mad as hell. and she knew the day she came home she wasnt going back,the education issue makes me the madest, she was sent for an education, the web site misleads you to think they are getting one, i guess some do, my daughter did not. she is now very happy to be home and wants to go to school. shannon

[scottT]

i'm an attorney and since we pulled our son out a few weeks ago,  i've been daydreaming about possible litigation tactics.  one that occurs to me is that rather than (or in addition to) attacking the program directly,  to start by bringing actions (with the actual child as plaintiff,  of course)  against the persons who seize and transport,  then bring the program and staff in as a material witnesses, to give up  the names and contact info of more of their transport crews.  Then,  play the transporters off against the programs to see who comes up with best evidence of kidnapping, false imprisonment, conspiracy to effect same etc.  Any DA's, FBI agents,  or class action attorneys out there with insight?

[ This Message was edited by: scottT on 2003-06-20 06:58 ]

[MORSEGLASS]

DID YOU READ THE TICO TIMES? TODAY?

[FaceKhan]

I have been informed by lawyers with a lot of experience suing these cult programs that all that is really needed to destroy one is to pick a target. That and have a million dollars or so to put into the case because there will be nothing left to collect on when the dust settles.

There is now a class actions against WWASP as a whole and all the individual facilities and I think the individual owners and executives. I think that a court will see that their corporate umbrella system can't protect them since it is obvious that the Lichfield family and Kay personally profit from the organization as a whole and simply created the umbrella group to limit liability.


Its definitely true how you don't hear the whole thing right away. Even my friends who went to wildnerness programs came back raving about it and only a few months later admitted that there was a lot of problems with the place, like untrained staff yelling at the kids, and some of the kids just being completely messed up. Also they like to threaten you with how they can convince your parents to keep you there or send you to Samoa (thats what alldredge staff said anyways) if you try to escape.

_________________
No greater love hath a man, then he lay down his life for his brother, not for millions, not for glory, not for fame, for one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.

[ This Message was edited by: FaceKhan on 2003-06-20 10:32 ]

[MORSEGLASS]

today is a great day!, i would love to be a fly on the wall when this story aired,   a fly in st george utah!!!!!

[Anonymous]

We are looking for an attorney in TX. in the Houston area if possible. Our neice was placed in WWASP by her Father and adoptive Mother on or around March 9, 2003. She has now been in three of the facility's, Carolina Springs, Dundee and after Dundee closed she was sent on to the worst of the worst, Tranquility Bay. Our neice just spent her 17th birthday behind bars, because she spoke out about abuse she had suffered at the hands of her parents. If there is anyone out there willing to help please call 651-452-2938 or E-Mail michaelneumann@comcast.net.

[Anonymous]

To the Attorney:

  Contact this Man...he can help you.

 Philip Elberg, Newark New Jersey.  He's the lawyer who won 4.5 million against a similar treatment program called "kids of north jersey."
He knows ALL ABOUT these types of places, and he can provide you with much information. I don't have his phone number, but someone here can supply you with the email address. He's easy to find. I think he has an office out of Newton, New Jersey also.

[scottT]

...(and in a possibly lighter vein) wire service reports say that at this week's meeting of the European Union,  when Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was told about the upcoming filming of a new movie about Nazi concentration camps, he was overheard to say that based on his experience, he would be an excellent choice for one of the starring roles as "the kapo"  (a prisoner rewarded by the Nazis for informing on fellow prisoners). (This part has been reported on CNN).

I don't care if he IS the prime minister of Italy,  he should have to start at level zero and work his way up through discovery, focus
and visions just like everybody else.

[ This Message was edited by: scottT on 2003-07-03 08:32 ]

[ This Message was edited by: scottT on 2003-07-03 08:34 ]