Copper Hills Youth Center(RTC) Malpractice Lawsuit

[Deborah]

http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_4082361

Ex-patient claims malpractice, sues treatment center
Copper Hills: He says a medication caused a painful injury and long-term damage
By Kirsten Stewart
The Salt Lake Tribune

Allegations of abuse and other misdeeds continue to plague Copper Hills Youth Center, a West Jordan psychiatric facility for troubled youth.

Andrew Tafoya of Los Lunas, N.M., has filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against the treatment center and one of its former doctors, James A. Miller, alleging that an anti-depressant Tafoya was prescribed while a patient at Copper Hills left him permanently disabled and disfigured.

The complaint follows probes by Utah licensors and child welfare officials into alleged physical and sexual assaults at Copper Hills. The facility was cleared, though investigators suggested improvements to the supervision, training and criminal screening of employees.

Utah Human Services licensing director Ken Stettler said there have been no recent complaints or sanctions filed against Copper Hills. State Division of Occupational and Professional Licensing officials, who are responsible for investigating individual malpractice claims, won't disclose whether Miller is under investigation. To date, no disciplinary actions have been filed.

Tafoya was admitted to Copper Hills in December 2002 for depression and a drug abuse problem. He was 17 years old.

According to his lawsuit, he was prescribed several medications by supervising physician Miller, including trazodone hydrochloride, an anti-depressant sold under the brand name Desyrel.

"Within weeks of first taking the trazodone, Tafoya began experiencing painful erections lasting 1 to 2 hours," the lawsuit states.

According to a warning posted by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), one side effect of trazodone is priapism, a persistent erection caused by a pathologic condition rather than sexual desire.

The FDA recommends that patients who experience priapism stop using trazodone immediately and contact their doctor. Left untreated, priapism can result in permanent damage and impotence.

Tafoya said he told Miller about his negative side effects, but staff continued to prescribe and administer trazodone.

Since returning home in the summer of 2003, Tafoya has continued to suffer bouts of priapism, requiring at least three corrective surgical procedures, the lawsuit says.

Neither Miller nor Copper Hills executive director Mike Rowley could be reached for comment. Tafoya, now an adult, also did not respond to attempts to contact him.

In January 2006, the Division of Child and Family Services canceled its contract with Copper Hills for residential, or inpatient, treatment of foster children. Human services spokeswoman Carol Sisco said a second outpatient contract is currently up for annual review. Up to 17 foster children and four juvenile delinquents under state custody are currently being treated there, said Sisco.

Prompting one of the earlier probes was the 2005 arrest of a counselor on seven felony counts of sodomy and forcible sexual abuse of a teenager under her care. The alleged perpetrator, Melanie April Seager, has yet to stand trial.
http://www.copperhillsyouthcenter.com/program.htm

[Deborah]

Youth facility criticized; state reports it is making progress
Salt Lake Tribune/April 29, 2005
By Kirsten Stewart
In the summer of 1999, child welfare officials sent Stephanie Eatough, a 15-year-old who had spent a third of her life in foster care, to Copper Hills Youth Center for substance abuse treatment.

But after six months at the West Jordan psychiatric facility, Eatough was drawn into a sexual relationship with a counselor twice her age, sending her "off the deep end," she says.

The man was fired and Eatough put the "nightmare" behind her - until hearing in March that another Copper Hills counselor had been arrested and charged with seven felony counts of sodomy and forcible sexual abuse.

The arrest triggered an investigation by state licensing officials, who discovered alleged perpetrator Melanie April Seager had never undergone a criminal background check. On April 1, regulators gave the facility 30 days to come back into compliance or have its license suspended.

"I hoped that things had changed down there. Apparently, they haven't," says Eatough, now a 21-year-old Layton resident and single mother of a 10-month-old baby girl.

With her mother, Michelle Ferry, who regained custody of her shortly before her 17th birthday, she sued the facility and settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.

Eatough urges the state Divisions of Child and Family Services (DCFS) and Juvenile Justice Services to sever their contracts with Copper Hills. The two agencies have 17 children at the 126-bed facility.

Copper Hills executive director Mike Rowley, a licensed clinical social worker, won't discuss the recent arrest, Eatough's allegations, the facility or its track record.

Licensers this week lifted the suspension order after Copper Hills retroactively performed all required background checks. Seager was fired in January, as soon as Copper Hills administrators say they learned she had allegedly molested a 16-year-old female ward of the facility for the previous three months.

"In most cases, failure to keep up on background checks would have merited a warning," said state Human Services licensing director Ken Stettler. "But because of the severity of this case, we felt they needed to have a real wake-up call."

Licensing officials believe the facility's current owners "will be able to bring the facility under control and be more watchful," Stettler said.

Since its 1997 opening, Copper Hills has operated under three different owners. Today, it is run by Kids Behavioral Health, a teen help provider headquartered in Reno, Nev., that also oversees programs in Montana, Hawaii and California.

When Eatough was at Copper Hills, it was under the ownership of Children's Comprehensive Services in Ohio. State licensers say the facility has changed from an in-patient psychiatric hospital to a secure treatment provider for drug abusers and sex offenders.

Eatough, who recently finished training to become a police officer, says she is a "different person" today than six years ago - then a "difficult" teenager who used drugs, was sexually active and prone to lashing out at authority.

But she is still angry at Copper Hills, contending staff knew she had suffered sexual abuse as a child, but initially "did nothing" when she disclosed that a 31-year-old counselor assigned to work with her had made sexual advances. Copper Hills did, as required by Utah law, notify state licensing and law enforcement officials, but investigations failed to yield enough evidence to support criminal charges or other sanctions. Sandra Lucas, executive director of the Utah arm of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), has complained to Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. about the state's "half-hearted" oversight of Copper Hills and is threatening to notify the court monitor assigned to oversee Utah's child welfare reform.

CCHR was established in 1969 by the Church of Scientology to investigate and expose psychiatric violations of human rights.

While under its current ownership, Copper Hills has been investigated twice for complaints ranging from sexual assault to fire and food safety violations.

In August 2004, the facility was cited for failing to maintain minimum staff ratios. Also from 2004, West Jordan Police have 36 reports of simple assault at the facility.

"If this was happening in someone's home, DCFS would intervene. That's what we pay them for," said Lucas. "How many more children are being abused? Abuse is abuse. I don't care where it happens or by whom."
http://www.rickross.com/reference/teenb ... oot42.html

[Deborah]

Journalist kidnapped to CHYC as a teen- treated for "Gender Identity Disorder" and Depression. Subjected to a regimen of reparative therapy, also called aversion therapy, which consisted of being forced to watch same-sex pornography while smelling ammonia, [4] hypnosis, [5] psychotropic drugs, solitary confinement, and therapeutic messages linking lesbian sex with "the pits of hell."

Born in California in 1976, Lyn Duff began her journalistic career as the founder of an underground school newspaper, The Tiger Club, while an 8th grader at South Pasadena Junior High School [1] in 1989. After five published issues, she was suspended from school by principal Ed Tucker for refusing to stop disseminating the newspaper.

After seeking help from the ACLU, the South Pasadena Unified School District agreed to allow Lyn Duff to return to school. She completed her 8th grade year and was then accepted as an early entrance student to California State University, Los Angeles (CSULA), which she attended for a year and a half.

While a student at Cal State LA, Lyn Duff was on the staff of another alternative newspaper published by Los Angeles art-critic Mat Gleason who, at the time, was a graduate student in the school of journalism and president of an alternative Greek organization, Omega Omega Omega.

In 1991, at the age of 14, Lyn Duff came out publicly as a lesbian.

Reportedly concerned about her daughter's sexual orientation, Lyn Duff's mother had her transported against her will Rivendell Psychiatric Center (now known as Copper Hills Youth Center in West Jordan, Utah. [2] During the drive from California to Utah, Lyn Duff managed a quick call to journalist Bruce Mirken, a friend who then wrote for both the Los Angeles Weekly and the Advocate. The two had had plans to meet for dinner before her "kidnapping" and upon hearing of her plight, Mirken quickly phoned Public Council, a public interest legal aid society which secured the pro bono services of corporate attorney Gina M. Calabrese of the Los Angeles firm Adams, Duque & Hazeltine to advocate on Lyn's behalf.

Lyn Duff was admitted to Rivendell Psychiatric Center on December 19, 1991. She was 15-years-old.

Although the treatment center was not officially affiliated with the Mormon Church, Lyn Duff later said that she was visited by LDS missionaries during her six months at the Utah facility and that the treatment she received had strongly religious overtones. Duff says that Rivendell therapists told her that a homosexual orientation was caused by negative experiences with people of the opposite gender and that having a lesbian identity would lead her to sexually abuse other people or engage in bestiality. [3] Duff was diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder and Depression.

Lyn Duff was subjected to a regimen of reparative therapy, also called aversion therapy, which consisted of being forced to watch same-sex pornography while smelling ammonia, [4] hypnosis, [5] psychotropic drugs, solitary confinement, and therapeutic messages linking lesbian sex with "the pits of hell."[6] Behavior modification techniques were also used [7] including: requiring girls to wear dresses, unreasonable forms of punishment for small infractions (punishments included trimming grass with small scissors and scrubbing floors with a toothbrush),[8] and "positive peer pressure" groups in which patients deemed and belittled each other for both real and perceived inadequacies. [9][10]

On May 19, 1992, after 168 days of incarceration, Duff escaped [11] from the Rivendell Psychiatric Center and traveled to San Francisco. [12]

While in San Francisco, Duff was homeless, living on the streets [13] and attending high school at the Larkin Street Youth Center and Central City Hospitality House. For a time she also lived in a series of safe houses through a network of gay adult advocates who had created a modern underground railroad for youth in her position. [14]

In late 1992, with the help of Legal Services for Children and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and with legal assistance provided by the National Center for Youth Law, Lyn Duff petitioned the courts to have her mother's parental rights terminated. She was one of a handful of children who "divorced" their parents that year; [15] an issue that gained national attention when reporters revealed that first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton had completed her master's thesis on the legal right of children to divorce their parents. [16]

In October 1992, a lesbian couple in San Francisco adopted Duff. She lived with them until the age of 18, when she began living independently and returned to college.

[edit]
Reporter and activist
From 1992 through 1998, Duff was an outspoken critic of the mental health system, appearing on CNN, ABC's 20/20, and numerous print, radio and television media outlets. She also spoke at a number of human rights, civil rights, mental health and youth services conferences [17] about her experiences and the rights of young people to live free of discrimination and oppression on the basis of their sexual orientation. [18] [19]

During these years she also served on the board of several national organizations including the National Center for Youth Law (board member from 1994-2001) and the National Child Rights Alliance (board member from 1992-1993, board chairperson from 1994-1999). In 1996, Duff was honored as a keynote speaker and given a human rights award at the international conference of the Metropolitan Community Church.

During these same years, Lyn Duff was emerging as a talented journalist in her own right, writing for Youth Outlook (a weekly column in the San Francisco Examiner) and the Pacific News Service. She joined the staff of Flashpoints, a daily hour-long drive-time show broadcast on Pacifica Radio's KPFA in 1994. Her writing appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner, Salon online, the Utne Reader, Sassy Magazine, the Washington Post, Seventeen Magazine, the Miami Herald and the National Catholic Reporter.

In 1995, Duff traveled to Haiti where she established Radyo Timoun ("Children's Radio"), that country's first radio station run entirely by children under the age of 17. [20] She reportedly worked closely with Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide. [21] [22]

In 1998, Duff graduated with a BA in International Affairs and Labor Law from Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York.
More at Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyn_Duff


One of those Mormon Missionaries
http://thewholenote.blogspot.com/2006/0 ... enter.html

Student Loans for an RTC
http://www.alternativestudentloan.com/e ... sname=Utah