Cheryle,
Glad you're here sharing your experience.
My ex placed our oldest son at a Marine Military Academy against my wishes. All of their promotional materials were designed to assure parents that hazing was strickly forbidden- zero tolerance- when in fact it was a daily occurence, doled out by upper classmen and the ex-vietnam drill instructor; who by the way, ran around at night in a ninja suit playing war games. The man was a nut job. We went round and round several times. The last time when I showed up unannounced for my regular visitation (court orders supercede any programs policies, btw). He was threatening my son- if he left with me he wouldn't be allowed back and that would cost his dad thousands of dollars. I told my son, who was hesitant at this point to get in the car, and gave the man a piece of my mind. I followed up with a complaint which fell on deaf ears.
There was one instructor for every 60-80 teen boys. Does that tell you who was really in charge, and how the boys were "kept in line"?
I finally convinced his dad to bring him back after 5 or 6 months and let him live with me. Shortly after he returned my daughter called to inform me of a class action being brought against the facility. As it happened, a young hispanic boy had his throat slit in the middle of the night by an upper classman. I had met this young man on one of my visits. My son said he was a target for racism and violence because of his race and size.
Parents were not allowed in the dorms. I went in to the foyer to test the waters. There was a young man on the floor screaming, three older boys standing over him. The foyer was chaotic, loud, just as you might imagine with a dorm of 60-80 teen boys with no supervision and the other cadets were moving about as if nothing was happening. When they noticed me they started saying things to him like, "Come on you're not hurt. You just got the wind knocked out of you." He wouldn't move so they dragged him through the swinging doors. I continued to hear him scream.
He was the unfortunate one who's throat was cut. And the most disturbing thing about this- his mother left him there stating, "It could have happened anywhere."
That incident caused many parents to begin to question the facility's line, "Don't listen to anything they tell you. They'll say anything to get out of here."
50 some families join the class which was eventually dissolved and we became individual plantiffs, which I think was better for the boys in the long run.
In helping my son with his deposition- he was 15 at the time, I was appauled by his accounts of what happened there. He was terribly confused about what consituted abuse. He would say, "Such and such happened, but that wasn't abuse or hazing. It was normal." Normal? No, not normal, but indeed common there. So they had conditioned parents to ignore complaints and conditioned the boys to believe their treatment wasn't hazing.
Our suit settled this month. It was a five year process because the facility filed bankruptcy and held everything up for two years. In the meantime, one of the insurance companies filed bankruptcy- shortly after 911. The CEO saw all our claims and many 911 claims coming, embesseled money and bankrupted the company.
My son is finally recovering from the effects of PTSD. Hopefully your son wasn't at Bethel long enough to incur too much lasting negativity, but I hope he will come away with a clear understanding of what is and isn't abuse and that he deserved none of it.
Anyway, good luck with your efforts. You probably can't share alot due to the lawsuit, but I hope you'll keep us posted. Ignore any rude responses you might get. I think it's safe to say that the majority of participants here would be very supportive of your efforts.
Deborah
PS. You might want to inform Barbe at Teen Advocate USA about your experience and particularly the lawsuit.
http://www.teenadvocatesusa.homestead.c ... a2003.htmlAs well as ISAC
http://www.isaccorp.com/Both could be helpful in getting the word out.
