HERE IS A SURVIVOR ACCOUNT OF CEDU, THE MOST INCLUSIVE ONE I'VE FOUND
I was Placed at CEDU Foundation In or about march 1973, when I arrived I had no idea, what so ever that the Dept. of Social Service was "dropping me off" I was told I was just going to go for the day to see if I would like to stay there. Within 1 hour, I found myself standing in a room with Mr. & Mrs. Wasserman, and Michael Allgood. I was told that Michael would be my "family head" and if I had any questions or problems he would be in charge of it all. I then, was taken into a room, and was told to sit in a chair while they cut my hair. They cut my hair to where it was just a few inches short., They took my clothes and only left me with a few pair of pants and tops and sent the rest back with my social worker. The reason I told for this was to "break your Image". I was then taken into a room and a Nurse? examined me , and then I was told to shower. I had never been in any place like this before, so I was already afraid. I was told I couldn't write or see any family members for at least 3-6 months depending on if I followed the rules. I hadnt been there much more than a few hours and I was called into a "Rap" session, there was probably 20 people at least in there, they were all yelling and screaming at each other, and I sat there just startled. All of a sudden Michael Allgood started yelling at me, stating that I was not going to sit in these sessions and not speak, I told him, that this was all "new" to me, and he said if you want to make it here, you will do what you are told, I started to cry, and told him that I didn't want to stay, and he told me that my family didn't want me, that's why they dumped me there, and he said, the only reason why they took me was for the money they would get from the county. He called me a lesbian, at the time I had no clue, that I was, and he said he thought I would learn to like it there real quick. I was only 15 at the time, and just lost my mother, so all of this was pretty scary, considering this was just the first day there. I learned to adjust, to play the game. and prayed that I would not get in Michaels way. he was very verbally abusive with me and it never got better. I eventually somehow, figured out to ask for a different family head over time. I finally got John Stallone, he was basically the closest person there with some sense of caring. I dont recall bad times with john. They had these rap Sessions that would last like 2 days they were called "profeets" there would be a group maybe like 20 -25 people and they would lock you in this room with 2 or 3 counselors, and they would play very Loud music continously, this would go on and on, and they would yell, and tell you how fucked up you were, and you were useless, and would never amount to anything in life, a lot of the kids and adults there were either court placed some private placed, and most of them were drug abusers. I never did drugs, until after I left Cedu. they would continue this until someone would emotionally snap, once you did, they would move on to the next person, once in a profeet they made a black boy wash Michaels feet. Michael thought he was like God , he called him the N word while this person washed his feet. They would accuse the boys of performing beastility acts on the animals, I dont know for fact if that happened but I was told it did as a punishement for the boys. I was blamed for my mother's death. I actually grew up after that believing that my actions as a Teen caused her to die, when in all reality, I was acting out because when I was 5yrs old, i was in a foster home, and was molested continually. I never said anything, until it was too late. We would remain in these Profeets until everyone snapped and I never recall any food in there, we did get bathroom breaks and water breaks. They said the less we had in our bodies made it easier for them to "cleanse" our souls. I guess when you are that young you will believe anything. The Dorm Leaders, were usually someone who had been there for quite some time. Most of the female ones were lesbian. Well, a lot of the girls were Lesbians. That's where I had my first Lesbian experience, with my dorm leader. If you were straight, you could get what they called your "Fucking Privledges" if you were interested with someone at least 6 months, and if you got past that, you would be allowed to have your privledges at 1 year. However, that rule didn't seem to matter with the staff. I know of cases where Rudy Bentz? had his "special" or favorite girls, if you wanted special trips to town, or pribledges you just had to know the right person to get what you wanted. Gay or straight. They had this one punishement called "dishpan Dishpan was for those who either did something really wrong, or if you tried to split, and got caught, or got away and had to re enter cedu, oh, and when that happened that meant the boys got their head completely shaved, the girls hair was whacked, all uneven. I got put on dishpan I think 2 or 3 times, the longest period I was on was for 2 weeks but usually it ws just a 2 or 3 day thing. When you were on dish pan you would work where ever they wanted to put you, I once had to clean all the bathrooms, with a sign around my neck saying " I AM POISON" that was Allgood's doing. When I did the bathrooms I had to use buckets of bleach, and a toothbrush. When someone would have to come use the bathroom, and Mike noticed, I would have to start all over. No one could talk to you and you could not talk to anyone. except family heads or counselors, and only if you were spoken to. The hours were like from 6am to 11pm you had to eat by yourself and quickly at that. there was NO breaks. One Dishpan I was on, I had to take all the trash out of one of those industrial size trashcans, climb in clean it with a tooth brush, then put the trash back in, another time I had to use a tootbrush on all the pool tiles and do the kitchen floors the same way, on your hands and knees. When I was on my last dishpan My hands were cracked and bleeding from all the bleach, and i would have to keep putting my hands in the bleach, I finally just couldn't feel them in the end. After that dishpan I got kicked out, and that was the happiest day of my life. They drove me in the middle of the night to some apt in reche canyon, we were there for about 1 hour, I dont know what they were doing they locked me in the car with a counselor, when they came out they drove me to my sisters in LA and just dropped me off in front of her house and left, it was like midnight. Thank God, they were home. When I was at CEDU Mel wasserman used to send probably like a van load of us down to anaheim, san bernaardino, and surrounding shopping centers, and have us all out in the parking lots approaching people asking them for money. We were told to them that we would be closed down if we didn't raise money for a new fire alarm system. I did this for a few months, we would give them a raffle ticket, to what I have NO clue, but I remember when we got back to the lodge we would have to count up all the money, and I remember it being thousands of dollars, and sure enough we would be out the next day, only at a new shopping center, i remember going close to Los Angeles, and once thought I was so close to home, but I think by that time, I was starting to believe in CEDU. In other words I was becoming like the rest of them....brainwashed. I never even noticed if they had a fire alarm system or not. The worst things I can remember is the verbal abuse, the sex acts, and if you even mentioned it was something that you didn't want to be involved in you were told you would get sent to Juvenile Hall, some faced prison sentences, or they would threaten you with somewhere much worse. The Wassermans would eat in the living quarters at the time overlooked San Bernardino, I remember how they would order steak dinners and we would have to serve them, while we ate food which was donated, from the places we were out begging for money from. This is just a touch of what I went through at Cedu, I know so much more, and went through so much more. I know of one kid who lived in Las Vegas that actually took his life when we went home, because they said he couldn't deal with life anymore after CEDU. They ran CEDU from what I understand a lot like the old Synanon in Santa Monica, CA. In fact some of the older people who were there were from Synanon, and even the counselors, we had one guy who was a Sniper from NYC He was hired as a counselor. Nice Huh? I ended up living with a counselor who was fired eventually, she was the one who turned me out into the Lesbian lifestyle. So much to tell, I could go on and on, this is just minor things. I would really be interested in that documentary, I would think it would be interesting to have someone who was there in 1973 comparing what they went through with the same people all the ways into the late 1980s & 1990s and better yet, find out why these people who are still alive an well are allowed to continue to work and arent behind bars, where they deserve to be for totally destroying kids lifes for the past 30 plus years. I would like to know how they got away with this? I would like to know who is going to help all of these people they mentally messed up? I know my life has never been the same. I cant imagine the younger kids how they must be coping. Please keep in contact with me, I want to see this through to the end!
