http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... g-jBxybnAAThis is a staff list for Elan School in Poland, ME
(we are working to acquire the complete records for ALL years)
We advise current and/or former staff to report any abuses you may have witnessed while working at Elan School. For information on your rights and how to take action, visit
http://www.heal-online.org/blowthewhistle.htm. If you were fired or forced to resign because you opposed any illegal and/or unethical practices at Elan School, you have the right to take action.
If you were harmed (family or survivor) by Elan School, please contact
info@heal-online.org if you remember the long-term employees and from which years. This will help! Also, if you recognize any of these staff as having worked at another program, please send in any information about their past or present employment at other facilities and/or cults.
Please don’t place your loved one in Elan School and rescue them if they are there now.
Name
Unit/Position
Additional Information
Martin L. Kruglik Senior Program Director Kruglik has been with Elan since 1972.
Clare Woodman Senior Program Director Woodman has been with Elan since 1984.
Jeffrey Gottlieb Staff Has "worked" for Elan since he graduated the program in 1972. (CULT)
Joseph Ricci Founder of Elan Cult
Gerald E. Davidson Co-Founder of Elan Cult
Peter Rowe Staff Graduate of Assumption College--Catholic College founded by the Augustinian Sect. St. Augustine was big on torture and used/supported/endorsed torture to "convert" thousands of "heretics".
Melissa Esty Residential Director Esty has been with Elan since 1991.
Kathleen Sherberne Residential Director Sherberne has been with Elan since 1993.
Adam Asselin Staff Asselin has been with Elan since 2005.
Deanna Raihl Staff Has "worked" for Elan since he graduated the program in 1998. (CULT)
Nick Pitarys Staff/Case Management Pitarys has been with Elan since 2009.
Peter McCann Director (former) Reported by survivor who attended program in 1976.
Ken Zaretsky Assistant Director (former) Reported by survivor who attended program in 1976.
Danny Bennison Assistant Director (timeframe ?) Reported by survivor who attended program in 1976. Bennison reportedly claims to have held the title of Assistant Director on the online message board known as fornits.
Mark Rosenburg Staff (1996-1999) Reportedly an Elan "graduate" who became a top staffer for the program.
NO OTHER NAMES NO OTHER TITLES Please contact us with information on staff and their histories.*
Elan School is "proudly" affiliated with NATSAP.
(Elan School, like many other programs in this industry, keeps a "tight lid" on any specific information regarding their staff, qualifications, and practices. Please contact us with the names of any staff of which you have firsthand knowledge or experience. Thank you for your help.)
Survivor Declaration--Sharon Wittwer (1984-1986)
Survivor Website--http://theelanschool.tumblr.com/
Survivor Declaration--Nick Schwamb (2007-2009)
Survivor Declaration--Jessica Charnov (2004-2007)
Excerpt from: "Duck in a Raincoat" by Maura Curley:
Chapter Five
In Their Own Words...
"Despite requests to Joe Ricci and his lawyers for Elan success stories to be included in this book, none were furnished...
Former residents and staff members consequently were tracked down through newspaper advertisements and by word of mouth. Conversations with nearly two dozen people who were at Elan at different intervals between the years 1971-1988 reveal striking similarities, though these people come from five different states, and varied economic and social circumstance. In most cases they have not talked to each other since leaving the program. All contacted were willing to discuss their experiences, though some did not want their names used for fear of reprisal.
Stephen Smith now 29 was 15 years old when he was sent to Elan by a social worker in Connecticut. He had been a ward of that state since the age of six when his father signed over custody of Stephen and his sisters after their mother had been sent to prison for robbery.
At fifteen he was sensitive and withdrawn, read books all the time, and hated school because the other kids seemed childish, and had perfect families. He explains that the circumstance that led to his going to Elan involved an altercation with a neighbor whom he "shot in the butt" with a bb. gun after the neighbor kicked his dog. Stephen says his social worker gave him the choice of either going to jail or Elan. "I chose Elan because she told me it was like a summer camp in the Maine woods, " he recalled with irony from the warden's office of Maine State Prison where he was serving a ten year term for burglary.
Stephen is boyish looking, small boned with honey blond hair pulled back in a ponytail. His eyes portray a sadness, which his story supports. The images from his teen years are still alive for him, enough for his voice to crack when he talks about being raped by another Elan resident when he and three other boys and two girls were left in a semi isolation room for a period of more than a week. He is articulate and candid about his life before, during and since his years at Poland Spring and Parsonfield. "I don't care how personal you get," he says. "The most important thing is that the truth comes out about Ricci. He has no business screwing up kids, and making a fortune doing it. The state takes kids from messed up families, but they put them in places worse. If I was not messed up before I got to Elan, I certainly was afterwards..."
He says: "When I first got there, I couldn't believe it. Everybody was screaming and beating on each other. I had to sit in these groups, and I didn't want to talk to anybody. I feel that I was misdiagnosed. For one thing I didn't have a drug problem. Most of the kids that were in there were I guess there for drugs because I'd be sitting in the groups and they'd want me to talk about what drugs I was doing', what I was hooked on. And I said, 'listen I don't have any of that,' and they'd all say 'Oh yeah? sure !' as If I was denying it. Then they'd ask me if I hated my mother. They'd take out my file and read in front of everyone in the group, things about my mother and her criminal record. I didn't dig that, so I just didn't say anything. And then when I shut up, they accused me of intimidating the group, said I was doing some violent act against the group members for not opening up. I was making people hostile at me. So everyone once in a while they'd set up a general meeting, and then throw me in the boxing ring until I lost. So I just used to try to run away all the time. Its the only thing I ever did; try to run away every chance I got. I tried about seven times, but they always caught me because they had this posse that would go out. If they caught someone they'd be rewarded by Ricci..."
"The first time I met Joe Ricci..." he continues, his voice getting softer, and more serious, "...was at a general meeting that was called by a guy named Jeff Gottlieb. I had tried to run away again, and Joe Ricci came in. I'll never forget it, because he made me feel really worthless, you know like I was an absolute nothing. He came in and I was called up along with a girl named Nancy, and another girl named Marie, two guys named Ray, and Johnny, and another kid named Sean. So when Joe Ricci came in to the house we were all sitting down around a table, and he announced: 'We have some cancer in this house, and any good surgeon knows the best way to get rid of cancer is to cut it out, before it spreads.' Then he called all of us up in front of the house, and asked everybody else if they had any feelings for us, so we all got screamed at. Then they put us in the boxing ring you know. Then at the end of the meeting Joe Ricci says ' Now we're gonna put you upstairs in one of the rooms. It was a room about the size of this. (6x10) and they boarded up the windows, and boarded up the door and locked it. And he said 'Whatever goes on in there goes on.' It was in July...I know it was in July, because it was my 16th birthday the next day... It was horrible. Six of us all stuck in there together. The guys- Ray and Johnny would take turns beating each other. Ray would pound his head until he got tired. And they'd take turns having sex with the two girls. One of them didn't care, but the other girl didn't want to, but they made her. Sean and Ray would keep her food, and that's how they got to her. The day I turned 16 I was sitting in the corner and I mentioned that it was my birthday, and Sean picked me up and said 'Oh it's you're birthday, I have something to give you...' He started to hit me in the face and stuff, and then, well he raped me in there," he says, his voice trembling.
"After Sean did that stuff with me, he made me do it with the others..." Stephen continued, taking a breath and observing: "Between that time, and one other time I think it had a lot to do with me not having normal relationships with girls. It's really screwed me up, and during the past years I've gone from blaming my mother, or my social worker Mrs. Daley, for what happened to me at Elan. But I realize it was really Joe Ricci's fault. He didn't care what happened to us in the room, or anywhere else. He was just in it for the money, and he didn't care about kids. He was running a business and that's all it was."
Other punishments Stephen detailed included cleaning toilets with bare hands, wearing signs, and doing meaningless chores just to be taught a lesson: "I'd have to push this wheelbarrow down to the lake in the summer, about a mile while wearing a winter coat," he says. " And I'd have to get rocks out of the water, and fill up the wheelbarrow, and bring it back up again, then empty them out, and then fill the wheelbarrow up , and go back down to the water. Other times I'd dig ditches and fill them up again. The whole time they'd be one or two people watching, and hollering to hurry up. It was totally meaningless...and this was all just because I wouldn't talk in groups, or I'd try to run away...Sometimes I'd get a cowboy ass kick too," he recalled. "One time Joe Ricci was there and he said he was sick of my shit, trying to run away and stuff. I tried to talk to some people who came up from Chicago to do some kind of investigation, and I think that's what he was all pissed off at. I never talked to them though. Anyhow I got a cowboy ass kick then. That was when they took you and threw you from room to room bouncing you up against the walls. All the residents would drag you around digging you with their hands, punching you , and spitting in your face. It was a lot worse than the ring. It was really vicious."
Stephen doesn't hesitate to compare Elan with the maximum security prison where he was incarcerated. "Elan's much much worse...Here there's a lot of shit. But I get a chance for some solitude, to read, and I'm going to college. I 've also gotten to learn woodworking, and make some money in the prison store. At Elan, there was nothing positive, it was pure hell," he concluded. "You know the worst thing is the judge that sentenced me here (for 10 years ) lectured to me saying I blew the opportunity I had at Elan...I don't understand how the courts can legitimize a guy like Ricci who has harmed so many mixed up kids."
Last Updated: September 23rd, 2010
