Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > The Troubled Teen Industry
Rick Santorum & Universal Health Services (UHS)
Reddit TroubledTeens:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/0 ... 86443.html
Rick Santorum-Linked Universal Health Services Facility: Fraud, Assault And Alleged 'Exorcism'
by Jason Cherkis jason.cherkis@huffingtonpost.com
First Posted: 01/06/12 08:22 AM ET Updated: 01/06/12 04:09 PM ET
WASHINGTON -- Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) has become a top-tier candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in recent weeks by appealing to evangelical voters as a man steeped in family values and his Christian faith. From 2007 to 2011, however, Santorum served on the board of directors of Universal Health Services Inc., a large hospital chain which racked up dozens of allegations of abuse during that time -- including everything from rape to suicide attempts allowed by neglect to murder.
Over the years, states have barred children from attending UHS facilities over safety concerns and the feds have put UHS on their radar. Department of Justice lawyers have filed two lawsuits accusing the chain of fraudulent activities. One lawsuit settled for $27.5 million. Another suit still pending in federal court in Virginia centers on a facility called Keystone Marion Youth Center.
The facility, located in Marion, Va., is a residential treatment center for troubled boys with mental-health issues. The majority of patients come from states' child-welfare and juvenile-justice systems. The center promises stability, schooling, and clinically-approved therapies. It was also approved to accept Medicaid patients.
It did not have approval to perform an "exorcism."
But that is what appeared to be happening in an empty room at Marion in May 2007, according to a facility teacher who passed by the room, which was occupied by at least one nurse, a supervisor, a janitor and a boy with autism. Several in the room appeared to be hovering over the boy and praying, according to the teacher, who recounted the incident shortly after to Barbara Jones, the center's director of education at the time.
The severity of the boy's autism left him hardly able to speak and unable to walk on his own, Jones says.
"'They were trying to exorcise him. That's why he had the autism, he had a demon in him,'" Jones recounted what the teacher told her to The Huffington Post. "The cleaning lady was trying to cast out the demons."
The Marion Center repeatedly fell into trouble with authorities before and during the time Santorum served on the board. He resigned this past June to focus on his campaign. UHS facilities across the country -- from the former senator's home state of Pennsylvania to Illinois to Tennessee to Texas and Kansas -- have come under fire as well. Authorities have thrown around words like "systemic failure" to describe the UHS treatment centers and have sued them for millions in court settlements.
Santorum served on the UHS board's compensation committee and the nominating/corporate governance committee, which appear to play no direct role in overseeing hospital operations. But the board -- like any corporate board -- is responsible for maintaining oversight and making sure facilities are safe and do not violate the law. Bloomberg has reported that Santorum has made close to $400,000 off his relationship with UHS.
Santorum's campaign declined to comment, referring inquiries to UHS. But in an interview with Yahoo News this week, Santorum said that as a member of the board, he cooperated with the DOJ's Medicaid fraud investigation.
"Any investigation, you obviously engage and fully cooperate with it, and that's what we did. You try to get to the bottom of it. There's always accusations that take place and that's part of the responsibility of directors to make sure that we investigate that and get to the bottom of it," Santorum said. "I don't have any stock options. I did, but I exercised them and they're gone."
UHS issued a statement to The Huffington Post concerning the Marion Youth Center.
"There are hundreds of adolescents who have received high quality, successful care and treatment at Marion Youth Center," the company wrote in an email, "and have had their lives dramatically improved as a result of the efforts of the dedicated individuals that work at Marion."
The hospital chain responded directly to the exorcism charge, calling the allegations "absolutely false, libelous and knowingly untruthful."
A state report counters this claim and appears to back up Jones' recollections of the incident as relayed to her at the time, and its subsequent fallout. According to the report, state investigators noted that the Marion Youth Center initiated an internal investigation into the matter as well. An administrator with the facility reported to state investigators that staff had been caught "praying over" a boy. "Provider determined the youth did not give consent for the event to occur," the state investigation found. "One regulation violation was determined."
The most shocking thing about the incident, however, was that it didn't shock. As Jones says, "It didn't surprise me."
* * * * *
Jones, 44, began working at the Marion Youth Center in July 2006 to take over the treatment center's school. The center was small, holding only 48 beds, and it only took boys between the ages of 11 and 17 and sometimes older. She was in charge of setting the curriculum, supervising seven teachers and implementing a behavior modification program. "It was appealing to me to run a school," Jones says.
But when she arrived, Jones says there was no school to run. She found teachers would convert a group room into a makeshift classroom. There were no chairs. There were no books. She found boys either playing video games or sleeping on the floor.
"There was a couple broken down chairs," Jones remembers. "The walls were dirty. The floor was dirty. It was chaos. That was the best word. The teachers obviously didn't like it but that's what they were told to do."
Jones says she had to beg the center's management to make classrooms. She insisted that children were not meeting the contracted education requirements known as Individualized Education Programs. "They were saying they didn't have enough staff to be in the classroom," Jones explains. "It was about money and coverage. I had to pull out their educational plans ... to pull out the child's IEP -- a legal document."
The boys of Marion didn't just miss out on school. They were missing basics like proper clothing, Jones found. Many kids didn't have socks or shoes. A 17-year-old kid sent from West Virginia walked around in shower slippers and pants an inch or two too short.
"He didn't remember anyone buying him clothes," Jones says. "He hadn't been out of the building for a year."
The kids, she said, only had thin blankets on their beds. The facility had them sell Christmas cards to raise money for new blankets. "The kids designed them, and then I went out and sold them," Jones says.
As for treatment, the head psychiatrist rarely made appearances. Therapy was sometimes conducted in hallways. "It was called 'drive-by therapy,'" Jones says. "They would walk with the kid to the cafeteria and the kid would get their food. It would be written up that [the] therapist had seen the kid."
If a boy mouthed off or provided the slightest provocation, Jones says, sometimes the staff response was "brutal force." Virginia records obtained through a public records request show the state investigated assaults, AWOL's and inappropriate encounters between staff and patients at Marion during the time Santorum served on the UHS board, from 2007 to 2011.
In January 2009, Leslie Anderson, the then-director of Virginia's Office of Licensing for Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation, and Substance Abuse Services, emailed her superiors a scathing review of Marion.
"They just got cited for systemic abuse for letting several youth beat and pick on one resident repeatedly and not intervening," Anderson wrote. "They do not have a clinical director and their psychiatrists are very part time. They are barely functioning as a [residential treatment center]."
Incident investigation records bear out Anderson's assessment:
*On August 1, 2007, Virginia records show, "a youth alleged to a staff person that another staff 'slammed' his face onto the floor when restraining him" in late July. The Department of Social Services determined the staffer had been abusive.
*In March 2008, a staffer held down a resident while another kicked the resident in the knee. Records show one employee resigned the day of the assault. When interviewed, the staffer that held the boy explained: "I didn't realize that he kicked him that hard."
*In August 2008, a staff member admitted being the getaway driver for two boys who had gone AWOL. "One resident was transported to his home," the state investigation noted in a report written a month later. "Where the other resident was transported is not yet known." The report went on to state that the staffer had been cited for boundary issues with the patients. Two weeks before the escape, one of the boys said he had a "love letter" from the staffer.
*In May 2009, a mother reported that while her son was home for a few days during the previous month, he had numerous phone calls with a center therapist. During one call, records show, which was on speaker phone, she alleged that she heard the therapist promise her son a blow job if he didn't run away. During the conversation, the therapist suggested that she had already performed oral sex on the boy. The boy refused to cooperate with investigators.
*In August 2009, a nurse was found to have sexually abused a boy on two occasions. A staff member reported witnessing one incident. Another staffer reported that the nurse had explained that she had to take the boy's blood pressure. They were left alone for one hour. After that incident, the boy asked an employee "if he smelled like a girl."
Other incidents, Virginia records show, included a part-time staffer "diverting" ADHD meds, and criminal background checks not conducted for new employees.
Investigators also found that therapy goals were vague to the point of meaninglessness. Plans for patient care were not reviewed, and medications were managed without being documented. In one 2010 incident, a program director threatened jail if boys didn't "straighten up.'"
Jones alleges that managers only cared about keeping those beds filled. In July 2010, she filed a federal civil suit against UHS over the goings on at Marion, saying she was forced out for raising the Medicaid fraud issue with management.
During meetings, managers repeatedly emphasized slowing down the process for a soon-to-be exiting child. There were kids that could have gone home but didn't. "The kids that were warded to the state, those were easy prey for them," Jones says. State social workers were overworked and never seemed to make the trip out to the center. The kids were simply out of sight, out of mind.
"I used to call them 'The Lost Boys' because no one was really advocating for them," Jones explains. When staff couldn't justify keeping them, the boy would suddenly have an outburst over the weekend. It would be characterized as "anxiety about being released." The boy would earn an extended stay.
Jones's allegations echo those in the DOJ's 2007 lawsuit against the Marion Center. The charges in that case include drive-by therapy sessions in the center's hallway, doctoring records, billing for undocumented services, billing for 50-minute group therapy sessions that lasted half that time, and provoking residents into outbursts to justify a delay in their release.
In the 2010 amended complaint, DOJ lawyers argue that the center "was operated as a juvenile detention facility, not as a residential treatment facility, in violation of state and federal law."
The three plaintiffs in the DOJ complaint all worked as therapists employed by the Marion Center. All three raised the issue of the Medicaid fraud. All were fired in 2006. But both the DOJ's case and Jones' lawsuit contend that a pattern of fraud and whistleblower retaliation extended beyond that time, into the period when Santorum served on the UHS board.
In the statement sent to HuffPost in July, UHS initially denied the allegations brought by Jones and the DOJ. "We are defending these cases vigorously to demonstrate that Marion Youth Center did not engage in any fraudulent practices as alleged," the statement reads. The cases are ongoing, however, and the company declined to comment further.
But court records show that the company is close to finalizing a settlement with the government.
The Marion Center is closing. Its lease has run out and could not be renewed, UHS told HuffPost in an email. The last day for employees is Friday, UHS said. But hundreds of other UHS facilities remain open.
"For too many years, UHS has been given a free pass," says Susan Lawrence, a parent and advocate in Virginia whose adopted child had resided in a UHS facility. "And they're not being held accountable by the government agencies."
Lawrence is especially angry with board members like Santorum. "I'm also tired of board members pleading ignorance and getting a free pass when their corporations break laws," she says. "The board should have known. It was their responsibility to know."
"If Santorum cannot be responsible for knowledgeable leadership of a corporation as a board member," she says, "he could never lead the greatest country in the world."
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story indicated that were problems with a UHS facility in Kansas. The facility is located in Missouri.
This is the third in a series of stories on UHS facilities during Santorum's tenure on the hospital chain's board. The other stories can be found here and here.
Reddit TroubledTeens:
Note: this article says that Sembler is Romney's national finance co-chair. I'm not sure that's still true.
This NY Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/31/us/po ... -iowa.html) from Dec 30, 2011 says Sembler is "a top Republican donor and a member of Mr. Romney’s Florida finance team".
http://healthfreedom2012.com/HFblog/201 ... tt-romney/
Child-Abuse Rings: are Romney and Santorum Connected?
February 16, 2012
Written by droregano Posted in Uncategorized
Dirty Money, Child-Abuse/Molestation, Suicide, and More
They call it dirty politics. Yet, this takes politics it to a new level. This is the sexual and physical abuse of youths for political and financial gain. In acts sicker than can be imagined American youths are brutalized on a daily basis. These youths are belittled and tormented. They are even tortured and imprisoned. They are psychologically tormented. They are accosted and raped. Food and water is denied to them. It is wicked beyond belief. Moreover, it is all real and undeniable. Even worse, today’s political candidates are indelibly tied to it. That may shock some people. Yet, these ties are impossible to refute.
Who are these candidates who are directly tied to this abuse? They are Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum. The ties are largely through so-called Republican Party powerbrokers. Sembler’s role as an agent of corruption is beyond dispute. Yet, because of his political ‘favors’ he has been given many high appointments. Says Arnold Trebach, Professor Emeritus of Law at America University:
As a proud American I find Melvin Sembler, our ambassador to Italy, and his wife, Betty, to be profound embarrassments. It is important that their advice on the drug war and especially on drug treatment be ignored. Indeed, it might be best if Italians listened to what this powerful couple had to say about drugs—and then followed policies in precisely the opposite direction.
There are surely many doubters. Then, it was Reason.com’s Maia Szalavitz who titled her article in June 2007 “Romney, Torture, and Teens” Says John Gorenfeld:
For 16 years Sembler, with his wife Betty, directed the leading juvenile rehab business in America, STRAIGHT, Inc., before seeing it dismantled by a breathtaking array of institutional abuse claims by mid-1993. Just one of the many survivors is Samantha Monroe, now a travel agent in Pennsylvania, who told The Montel Williams Show this year about overcoming beatings, rape by a counselor, forced hunger, and the confinement to a janitor’s closet in “humble pants”—which contained weeks of her own urine, feces, and menstrual blood. During this “time-out” she gnawed her cheek and spat blood at her overseers. I refused to let them take my mind,” she says of the program. The abuse took years to overcome.
This is no isolated case. According to sworn testimony, as described by Barry Beyerstein in his book Thought Reform, and the Road to Hell Straight often left restrained group members sitting in their own urine, feces, or vomit, until suitable concessions were extracted.
According to the Cafferty Report Sembler’s evil knows no bounds. As Cafferty noted:
Soon enough, Straight’s tactics caught up to it in the courts…A college student won a false imprisonment claim of $220,000 in 1983, and another claim cost Straight, Inc., $721,000 in 1990. A Straight, Inc., spin-off, called “Kids of New Jersey” settled a $4.5 million abuse claim in 2000. Straight chapters across the country began to shut down, culminating with the last branch in Atlanta closing in 1993.
Now, make no mistake about it Romney’s involvement is far from incidental. Sembler is his national finance co-chair. Commonly, Romney shows a kind of brutally arrogant mean streak before the people, especially the pitiful and vulnerable. Then, again, Sembler is the founder of Straight, and, thus, all the acts which were achieved there, all the abuse, torment, and oppression—all the sadistic acts of child abuse, torment, and rape—but also all the murders, were under his watch. Sembler is responsible for these, and to a large degree Sembler is Romney.
It is not just the victims who have attested to this. Notes Maia Szalavitz in her 2007 article, “At all of Straight’s facilities state investigators…documented scores of abuses, including teens being beaten, deprived of food and sleep for days, restrained by fellow youth for hours, bound, sexually humiliated, abused, and spat upon. According to the L.A. Times California investigators determined that the teens at Sembler’s clinics were “subjected to unusual punishment, infliction of pain, humiliation, intimidation, ridicule, coercion, threats (and) mental abuse.” In addition, the most basic functions of life always take for granted for the young and developing, such as “eating, sleeping, and toileting,” were denied to them. Sadistic monsters—how else can they be described?
That Romney is involved with such a man does not bode well for his potential as the ruler of the land. Yet, then, they have more in common with each other than mere political campaigning.
These various clinics are not just run by anybody. Rather, many are run either by the Democratic Party or the GOP. In these various facilities, many of which are similar to those presided upon by Sembler, the following fatalities occurred:
Aaron Albert Grey, 16 years-old: died of unexplained causes in 2001
Aaron Wright Bacon, 16 years-old: died in 1994 of untreated abdominal infection
Alex Cullinane, 13 years-old: died in 2006, under investigation
Alex Harris, 12 years-old: died in 2005 of a blow to the head and dehydration
Agellika Arndt, 7 years-old: died in 2006 of traumatic asphyxiation while restrained
Anthony Dumas, 15 years-old: died in 2000, hanged himself; facility workers didn’t cut him down, took pictures
Anthony Green, 15 years-old, 1991, died of traumatic asphyxiation
Anthony T. Haynes, 14 years-old, 2001, died of dehydration
Ashley Shaddox, 14 years-old, died in 1998
Bobby Joe Randolph, 17 years-old, died in 1996 of traumatic asphyxiation
Bobby Sue Thomas, 17 years-old, died in 1996 of acute cardiac arrhythmia, while restrained
Brandon Hadden, 18 years-old, died in 1998, choked on his vomit while being restrained
Caleb Jensen, 15 years-old, died 2007, untreated severe staph infection
Travis Parker, 13 years-old, died 2005 from asthma after being denied treatment while being restrained
Tristan Sovern, 16 years-old, died 1998 from asphyxiation while being restrained
Valerie Ann Heron, 17 years-old, died, 2001, suicide by jumping from a balcony
Victoria Petersilka, died 2002, suicide by hanging
Unidentied, 16 years-old, died 2007, suicide by hanging
These are just a few of the victims of this murderous system. The world should be screaming at the top of its lungs at these crimes. Yet, hardly a word is not spoken nor a memory voiced. It would seem that Romney’s association with Sembler is more than merely for political connections. There is something far more diabolical here.
Consider another Romney associate, Robert Lichfield. The founder of the so-called World Wide Association of Specialty Schools (WWASP) Litchfield operated dozens of schools across the country and overseas, most of which were shut down after allegations of abuse. According to legal filings teens were “locked in outdoor dog cages, exercised to exhaustion, deprived of food and sleep, exposed to extreme temperatures without adequate clothing or water…” They were also beaten severely to the point of causing physical wounds and sexually abused. Suffering every conceivable humiliation, “some were even made to eat their own vomit.” All this occurred under Romney’s control.
Here is another example of his direct involvement. In 1984 Romney founded Bain Capital Group, which operated Aspen Educational Group. One of its facilities in Oregon was shut down by the Department of Human Services after substantial child abuse was proven by investigators. In one case in yet another program a 16 year-old boy died from what were determined to be “reckless” acts by the Romney subsidiary. The former Romney group has been slammed with a number of lawsuits for “emotional, physical, and sexual abuse” of the juveniles.
These youths were subjected to sadistic punishments such as having to reenact traumatic experiences, including prior instances of child sexual abuse before fellow residents, extreme isolation, prolonged deprivation of food and water as well as shelter and basic medical care. The victims, it was reported, were “required to go days with little or no sleep and also regularly forced into ‘chain gang’-style labor.” In yet additional torment phone calls to families were limited but also monitored…and “parents were instructed by staff not to believe their children if they claimed…abuse.” In other words, the parents were instructed that, as a routine, their children would lie and should not be believed: it was part of the process.
As if to confirm the malicious nature of the entity this Romney subsidiary established the following Waiver and Release, signed in advance, by parents delivering their children:
Sponsor intends by this Waiver and Release to release in advance and to waive his or her rights and discharge each and every one of the Release Parties from any and all claims for damages, death, personal injury, or property damage, which Sponsor may have or which may hereafter accrue as a result of the student’s participation…even though that liability may arise from negligence or carelessness (or) from dangerous, defective property or equipment…Additionally, sponsor covenants not to sue any of the Sponsors…
A history of sadism also surrounds Santorum. It was this man who was indelibly tied to that vile monster and noted child rapist Jerry Sandusky. Yes, it’s true despite plausible denials Santorum is directly connected with a pedophilia ring headed by ex-assistant Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky. The founder of a Pennsylvania-based charity purporting to aid troubled juveniles, Second Mile, Sandusky used the facility for far different reasons than acclaimed. The orphaned, troubled, and vulnerable children/teens he took in were, in fact, commonly raped. Sandusky himself had sex with dozens of them.
It gets even worse. As reported originally by Wayne Madsen Sandusky and his vile ones farmed numerous of these children out to be used as sex objects. This was by the mighty and rich, including U.S. Congressmen and Senators as well as rich donors. Like Sandusky, Santorum housed these juveniles as pages, making them ultimately available to both the wealthy and Washington, D.C.-based politicians. That’s why he tries to deflect people from the issue.
Yet, what was Santorum’s position on Sandusky? He regarded him so highly that he personally gave him an award, the Congressional Angels in Adoption Award. It is beyond belief: that Santorum-orchestrated award honored him for ruining the lives of vulnerable children and adolescents.
Sandusky has since publically admitted his proclivity for these acts.
When NBC’s Bob Costas interviewed Sandusky, asking him, “Are you sexually attracted to young boys or underage boys?,” he responded, as if he didn’t hear the question, “Am I sexually attracted to underage boys? Yes.” The man is so fixed in his rot that he couldn’t resist proclaiming this, even on national TV. He also admitted that he was caught sexually abusing a 10 year-old boy in a shower at Penn State. In describing the unspeakable said assistant coach Mike McQueary, who witnessed the act, Sandusky was raping the child in the anus. McQueary reported this directly to the head coach, Joe Paterno. However, Paterno failed to report it to the police. As the traumatized youths kept coming forward, lawsuits for sexual abuse were launched. As a result, Santorum’s and Sandusky’s ‘angelic’ adoption center was shuttered, and all assets seized in order to settle the suits.
Now, while Santorum denies it he is indelibly tied to Sandusky.
As revealed by Wayne Madsen in the Madsen Report these men worked closely not only in the Second Mile project but also directly in placing the youths in harm’s way. Santorum himself used these youths in his offices as pages. In other words, regarding these highly vulnerable juveniles the two worked as a team. However, now, when asked about it, what does Santorum say? He says that, as reported on November 8, 2011, by the Philadelphia Inquirer, he “does not know Sandusky personally.” Then, who presented the award, his fairy God mother? Santorum also defended those high ones at Penn State, saying they should be treated leniently. Even after child rape was officially reported by the police the highly compromised Santorum stood strong for both Sandusky and Paterno, instead of defending the families and children. When people questioned Paterno’s failure to report the crime to police, which is a state law, again, Santorum came to his defense. In contrast, he never said a word of concern about the victims or their families, and that’s a big never. The family values candidate can now be categorically re-named the Unfamily values candidate.
Yet, through Santorum’s blockade how many other people were harmed? How many other youths were raped and abused because of the indifference of Santorum, Penn State officials, and their likes? As a former Senator and close associate of Sandusky he was in the position to help: to make the revelations that could have prevented further horrors. He could have assisted those tormented ones, cooperating with the police. Not this individual. Instead, he maintained the cover of the perpetrators.
This is not the first time Santorum ran cover for pedophiles. In 2006 on PCNTV during the Mark Foley scandal, when interviewed about the issue of the molestation of pages he said:
You know, if we’re talking about page programs—when the national security of this country is hanging in the balance—and the media says, ‘no, don’t pay attention to that, let’s focus on this.’
Clearly, Santorum was running interference for Foley, but was that the only reason for his attempt to distract? Even so, regarding Foley, while he had all along been molesting congressional pages, it was only when a degree of evidence surfaced that brought this to light. So, what was Santorum defending? It was surely not family values but acts that are the most anti-family conceivable. It was “suggestive emails and sexually explicit instant messages” sent “to under-age males” who were at that time working as congressional pages.
Yes, Santorum did the inconceivable. He took action to distract attention from this. As the family candidate isn’t his duty to do the opposite, which is to bring attention to the molestation of the basis of the family, which is the children? Shouldn’t he have held strong in defense of the pages and their families, calling for the most extreme measures to protect the innocent, the tormented? Instead, he sought to cause people to focus on some supposed external threat, those dangerous ‘Muslims’, which he merely invents? What kind of sick criminal is he that he would maliciously and purposely run interference for Foley, just like he did for the perpetrators at Penn State?
After all, it was Foley himself would said as reported by Satyam Khanna that his lurid emails were just “a momentary lapse of judgment,” while admitting that he carried on “the computer conversations for months, asking about masturbation, sex, and other details.” In real life no one does this with juveniles, except a pervert. Would anyone want that done to their sons or daughters? He even had the audacity to say that he’s “not a pedophile, because the pages were almost 18.”
Now, have no doubt about it Foley not only emailed these pages but also had sex with a number of them. He just did it in a tricky way. He kept soliciting them for sex and then waited until the pages were 18, and it was then that he had sex with them. Sick as he is, it was Foley who was the former co-chair of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children. That scheming pedophile clandestinely placed himself in the perfect position. Here, he helped enact laws that toughened the penalties on Internet predators, who solicited sex from youths. Placed in this position, he well knew that the high penalties were for those who then perpetrated the molestation before 18. After that, it could be disguised as “consensual.” Yet, he was precisely one such Internet predator, since he was soliciting sex, particularly in 16 and 17 year-olds. Then, according to the youths themselves when they reached 18-years of age he had sex with them. Remember, these were youths put under the auspices of Congress to serve the Congressmen. They had put their trust in these men. There could be no crime greater than to molest such vulnerable youths.
So, Mr. Santorum, why are you doing anything on behalf of this man? Why did you run interference for him, blaming the media, if you care anything about these youth’s families? Are you connected directly to that page-soliciting pedophilia ring? You do have much to hide. Otherwise, why else would you make every effort to deflect the issue?
What degree of pain did they needlessly suffer, what psychological damage that was preventable, all because Santorum helped disguise and minimize their crimes? Here again, the always hypocritical Santorum is supports to the bloody end precisely the people he condemns, adulterers, pornographers, rapists, and pedophiles, while paying no heed to the victims, the families. Who could be viler than this? Anyone who supports this man is supporting not only hypocrisy but pedophilia itself.
Then, what are his connections to pedophilia? They are significant, so much so that he chooses to lie about it. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer Santorum said he doesn’t know Sandusky. Now, wait a minute. He was the one who handed him that special award, “Congressional Angels in Adoption Award” in 2002. He didn’t just give him the award at that gala event but also sponsored the then assistant coach to achieve it. His statement “doesn’t ever recall meeting him” is not merely a lie; after all he personally gave him that award. It is all extremely telling. It proves he has much to hide.
What about the victims, Santorum? Do you care nothing for them? Thus, he said about Sandusky’s sadistic operation:
He ran a very respected charity who did a lot of work for kinds in trouble. I had a lot of friends who were on his board and spoke highly of him, so it seemed to me to be pretty natural. But it was obviously a huge mistake.
That’s not good enough. It’s still a cover-up. Santorum is still not talking the real talk, which is concern for the victims and launching an investigation to prevent more crimes.
Remember, in 2002 he knew about it and did nothing except to aid and abet the operation. He was, after all, a Senator in the midst of all this, while children were coming forward, and their families, claiming molestation. So, does his behavior jive with his words? According to Santorum:
You can say I’m a hater. But I would argue I’m a lover. I’m a lover of traditional families and of the right of children to have a mother and father. I would argue that the future of America hangs in the balance, because the future of the family hangs in the balance. Isn’t that the ultimate homeland security, standing up and defending marriage?
He says he loves “traditional families.” You see the words above. A traditional family is the parents plus children protected from harm and surely from sexual perversion. Yet, when the traditional family comes forward, like those suffering from Sandusky’s and Foley’s sadistic acts, what does Santorum do? He doesn’t defend the family or its vulnerable children. Incredibly, instead he defends the molesters.
The tobacco “family” candidate
Would a real family candidate be a promoter of big tobacco? Not hardly. Investigations into his lobbyist connections found that Santorum’s second-highest total came from the Altria Group, the newer face for Philip Morris Companies and U.S. Tobacco. The makers of Marlboro cigarettes and Skoal tobacco have spent some 100,000 in PAC funds to advance Santorum’s political career.
It was Santorum when as a member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, who opposed increased restrictions on the tobacco industry and was largely responsible for killing the 1998 Universal Tobacco Settlement Act.
The bill aimed to “prevent the use of tobacco products by minors” and to “redress the adverse health effects of tobacco use.” It also would have incorporated a settlement requiring the industry to pay billions of dollars to state governments. After Congress failed to pass it, a narrower settlement was reached between the tobacco companies and state attorneys general.
Through this action Santorum has damaged the family infrastructure by giving free reign for tobacco companies to do endless harm to the youth. How much did he get paid for that? He’s a family candidate, alright, when it comes to soliciting votes.
So, Mr. Romney and Mr. Santorum, how can these ties to pedophilia and the abuse of America’s youth be explained away? In fact, for both of these presidential candidates there is much explaining to do. Yes, there is a need for an immediate explanation of any involvement, for instance, Mr. Santorum, because this is the man who you honored:
In the fall 2000 a janitor named James Calhoun observed Sandusky in the showers of the Lasch Football Building with a young boy, known as Victim 8, pinned up against the wall, performing oral sex on the boy. He tells other janitorial staff immediately. Fellow Office of Physical Plant employee Ronald Petrosky cleans the showers at Lasch and sees Sandusky and the boy, who he describes as between the ages of 11 and 13.
What kind of children were abused? Normal children, your children, impoverished, vulnerable children. According to Lee Bailey’s Eurweb “Poor children became easy prey for Sandusky, who would start with mentoring, then move on to hosting the boys for overnights in the bedroom at his home, then initiate copulation, anal sex, according to the grand jury report.
Santorum, you lie: you say you don’t recall meeting or knowing this man. You know it is a lie.
It was also widely known that Sandusky was twice investigated for illicit acts with children:
In 1998 Gricar (the DA) made the decision not to file charges against Sandusky after a mother told university police Sandusky had inappropriate contact with her 11-year-old son. (Yet) according to detectives’ testimony (who eavesdropped on the conversation at the mother’s request) Sandusky told the mother… “I was wrong. I wish I could get forgiveness. I know I won’t get it from you. I wish I were dead…”
Now, it’s not he who wishes he was dead but the family—the parents and the children, as reported by on national TV:
One of the mothers of the victims, whose voice was disguised and recently spoke to Good Morning America in silhouette, said, “There was a time when my son started acting out. He was angry about something, we didn’t know what.”
How serious is this? It’s serious beyond belief. If a person in an office is found scanning the Internet on porn sites, such a one is fired immediately. No excuse. So, explain it, Mr. Santorum. The award was given in 2002. Penn State officials knew about Sandusky’s acts, and so did you. You knew about the prior abuse. Your own behavior belies it. Let’s hear you for once speak on behalf of even one of these victims instead of protecting the realm. Let’s hear your excuse, now. Prove to us that you really do care about our American families. And Mr. Romney, explain to us, too, your connections with the pedophilia/child abuse rings tied to both you and Mel Sembler.
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2008/ ... /foley-int…
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/fbi- ... ny-sex-in-…
santorumexposed.com/…/198-Santorum-Blames-Media-for-Page-Sca…
http://www.thestranger.com/slog/archive ... 3/rick-san…
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/01/05 ... ntorum-quo…
http://www.thestraights.com/index-archieves-p1.htm
http://thestraights.com/essays/beyerste ... _straight..
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/big_ ... 41763.html
http://cdn.mediatakeout.com/52300/mto-e ... port-most-…
www.youtube.com/watch?v=98xn9Suu12g
http://www.dailypaul.com/204354/the-vio ... of-rick-sa…
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/a-visibly-an ... santorum-b…
www.eurweb.com/…/boys-in-penn-state-molestation-scandal-ma…
http://www.rollitup.org/politics/504015 ... erial.html
http://www.thestraights.com/
http://medicalwhistleblower.blogspot.co ... ng-of.html
http://reason.com/archives/2007/06/27/r ... -and-teens
Reddit TroubledTeens:
http://watchinguhs.wordpress.com/2012/0 ... -combined/
It appears UHS paid Santorum more in the six months before he left to run for president than he received in the previous two years combined
Posted on February 29, 2012
CREW, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, takes a look at the compensation Rick Santorum received from UHS (http://www.citizensforethics.org/blog/e ... e-scrutiny). They found Santorum was paid $227,345 for six months’ work for Universal Health Services, right before he left to run for President. That’s more than he was compensated during the previous two years combined.
UHS’ political action committee and employees are the second largest source of contributions to Santorum’s campaign.
--- Quote ---Another question relates to Mr. Santorum’s compensation as a director of Universal Health Services, Inc. (UHS), a hospital chain based in Pennsylvania, in the months before Mr. Santorum announced his candidacy for president. Mr. Santorum joined the UHS board in 2007, and served until June 14, 2011, when he resigned to run. According to SEC filings, UHS paid him $50,412 in director fees and stock options in 2007, $77,958 in fees and options in 2008, $45,000 in fees in 2009 (no options were awarded), and $168,069 in fees and options in 2010.
UHS has not made public its 2011 director’s compensation yet, but it appears Mr. Santorum was paid more in the six months before he left to run for president than he was in the previous two years combined. On the personal financial disclosure form he filed in September 2011, Mr. Santorum declared UHS paid him $395,414 in director fees and stock options from January 2010 through June 2011. Subtracting the $168,069 UHS said it paid him in 2010, Mr. Santorum apparently was paid $227,345 for six months work for UHS. There is no evident explanation for the significantly higher compensation. Notably, however, UHS and its employees are major contributors to Mr. Santorum. In fact, the company’s employees and political action committee make up the second largest source of contributions to Mr. Santorum’s presidential campaign, giving him $20,000.
--- End quote ---
Reddit TroubledTeens:
This thread seems like a good place to house this....
http://veracitystew.com/2012/03/05/brai ... N-m.reddit
Brainwashing Kids: Rick Santorum’s Link to Controversial Youth Ministry
03/05/2012 · 8:20 am By Deb Della Piana Leave a Comment
Ron Luce / Teen Mania Ministries
It’s easy to dismiss Rick Santorum as the clown prince of the GOP. I find myself doing it because some of his positions are ludicrous, like prenatal testing encourages abortion. Or that we should end public education and all children should be home schooled. He believes that the Bible is our guidebook and that the Constitution should be minimized. He is the fundamentalist candidate for sure, and there is nothing democratic about fundamentalism. At it’s core, fundamentalism is totalitarian. Rick Santorum, although amusing, is also very dangerous. Particularly when it comes to young impressionable minds.
There are other disturbing things about Rick Santorum. One of those things is that he has been a vocal supporter of Ron Luce’s Teen Mania Ministries, stating “As a parent of six children, I am very cognizant of the impact of media and entertainment on our kids. In Battle Cry, Ron Luce takes the first important step in educating and equipping parents. It’s our job to take the next step parenting our children and helping them to navigate the culturally hostile world they and their peers live in 24 hours a day.”
What Santorum is referring to is Luce’s book, Battle Cry for a Generation, a book that enables our nation’s youth to understand the importance of faith and encourages them to defend it against the onslaught of secular thought found in their schools and in popular culture. In plain English, it discourages young people from thinking for themselves. It discourages critical thought. It’s goal is to ‘dumb-down’ kids. In the book, Luce identifies the enemies of youth as “Morally corrupt films and television programs; An increasingly perverted music industry; The pornographic invasion of the internet; Civil initiatives promoting gay marriage; Battles to remove the Ten Commandments from public buildings, and fights to take ‘under God’ out of the Pledge of Allegiance.”
For those who aren’t familiar with Teen Mania Ministries (est. 1986), one of the largest Christian youth ministries in the United States headquartered in Garden Valley, Texas, its goal is to brainwash our youth, then send them out into the world to brainwash others. Teen Mania boasts six major programs and, given Luce’s position on pop culture, it’s no surprise that one is “The Center for Creative Media” (for those who want to express their faith while working with television, film, graphic design and other media) and another is “The School of Worship” where young musicians are encouraged to use their music for the glory of God. If the brainwashing aspect of Teen Ministries isn’t scary enough, how it’s accomplished is horrifying.
On their site is a section called Extreme Camps, described as ‘A Life Transforming Experience.’ The activities are presented as fun, like Paintball, Extreme Olympics, and Extreme Pool. Then there’s the Splash Kingdom water park and something called E.T.A.C., or the East Texas Adventure Course. Here’s what they don’t tell you: Attendees crawl through mud, undergo sleep deprivation and verbal abuse, and are fed vomit-inducing foods. A documentary on MSNBC, entitled “Mind Over Mania,” showed a dish of live worms being served up for dinner. It may well be a life transforming experience, but not one of a positive nature as evidenced by the kids who have survived their ordeal to tell their story on a blog entitled Recovering Alumni.
On the Recovering Alumni site, you will learn the true extent of the brainwashing America’s Christian youth are subjected to. In the “Josiah Project,” Luce indulges in blatant gay bashing:
“Hi, I’m Ron Luce and today on Acquire The Fire we are going to talk about what does it mean to be a real man, to be a real man of God not some sissy little limp-wristed thing bouncing around acting like some pansy little Christian. Its about being a man of God like Jesus. Stay tuned if you want to be a real man.”
Their need for the interns to stick out the year in the Honor Academy is continuously rammed home. This is what brainwashing is all about. Says one of the alumni,
“They are told that if they leave the Honor Academy before their full year is up, their ability to be successful in life will be severely hindered and that even their future marriage is probably doomed since they presumably can’t keep a commitment. They are also told that they will be out of God’s will and therefore disobedient and rebellious. If you’ve never been to the HA, that might sound unconvincing or even trivial. But let me tell you, it is CONSTANTLY hammered into your brain by all levels of leadership to the point that most interns won’t even entertain the thought of leaving for fear of sinning against God.”
Ron Luce, founder of Teen Mania Ministries, presents his mission as a “battle.” On stage, images of weapons are often used. He uses current and former members of the U.S. Armed forces at the Battle Cry stadium events, encouraging teens to become warriors in the battle.
One watchdog site, called Acquire the Evidence (a play on Luce’s own Acquire the Fire) notes that Luce spends much of his time talking about how corporate America makes money by targeting the teen market without showing concern for their moral decay, yet many former product managers and advertising executives from companies such as Gillette, Proctor & Gamble and Leo Burnett Advertising have held high positions in Teen Mania Ministries. Luce himself has managed to make a tidy profit off teens. The ministry’s tax return for the year ending 2004 showed him earning $127,500 a year, while his wife earned an additional $35.000.
There’s no question that Rick Santorum is out of touch with the needs and beliefs of the majority of Americans, but he’s also out of touch with reality. What he supports is a Christian lunatic fringe organization that would teach the youth of America that it’s wrong to question and to think for themselves. Today’s youth is America’s future. I shudder to think what might become of this nation should they inherit it.
wdtony:
http://7thspace.com/headlines/409082/us ... tions.html
PROVIDED BY: 7th SPACE INTERACTIVE
USDOJ: Residential Youth Treatment Facility for Medicaid Recipients in Marion, Virginia Agrees to Resolve False Claims Act Allegations
Published on: 2012-03-28
Universal Health Services Inc. (UHS) and two subsidiaries have reached a settlement in a False Claims Act lawsuit with the United States and the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Justice Department announced today. Under the settlement, UHS and its subsidiaries, Keystone Education and Youth Services LLC and Keystone Marion LLC, which did business as the Keystone Marion Youth Center, a residential facility in Marion, Va ., agreed to pay $6.85 million to the United States and the commonwealth to settle allegations that they provided substandard psychiatric counseling and treatment to adolescents in violation of Medicaid requirements, falsified records and submitted false claims to the Medicaid program. UHS closed the Marion facility earlier this year.
This settlement resolves a whistleblower lawsuit filed by Megan Johnson, Leslie Webb and Kimberly Stafford-Payne, former therapists at the closed facility. UHS and its subsidiaries have paid an additional amount under the terms of the agreement to the former therapists to settle their separate discrimination and attorney’s fees claims. The United States and the Commonwealth of Virginia had intervened in the lawsuit on November 4, 2009.
Under the False Claims Act, an entity that submits false or fraudulent claims to the government is liable for three times the government’s damages, plus a civil penalty for each false claim. The claims settled by this agreement are allegations only; there has been no determination of liability.
“The Justice Department is committed to investigating cases in which health care providers have put patients at risk by failing to meet the appropriate standards of care,” said Stuart F. Delery, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “Today’s settlement demonstrates our commitment to protecting the integrity of the Medicaid program and making sure that patients who rely on federal health programs receive the care they deserve.”
“This settlement resolves disturbing allegations that Universal Health Services Inc. and its subsidiaries in Virginia made false records and presented false claims to Virginia Medicaid in connection with sub-standard care to emotionally troubled youth at a residential treatment facility in Marion, Virginia,” said Timothy J. Heaphy, United States Attorney for the Western District of Virginia. “This result, which provides substantial reimbursement to the Virginia Medicaid program, demonstrates our strong partnership with the Virginia Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and our commitment to use all available means, including civil remedies under the False Claims Act, to combat health care fraud.”
“Any organization providing substandard health services then sending inflated bills to taxpayers, as UHS is alleged to have done, can expect intense scrutiny by government investigators,” said Daniel R. Levinson, Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services. “Those intent on defrauding our programs should know that we will continue to work closely with State law enforcement agencies to fight Medicaid fraud.”
“This settlement, which returns a substantial sum to the Virginia Medicaid program, is a testament to the strength of such a collaborative partnership,” said Ken Cuccinelli, Virginia Attorney General. “This case sends a clear message that fraud and exploitation of our most vulnerable citizens will not be tolerated in the commonwealth.”
Acting Assistant Attorney General Delery acknowledged the efforts made by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Virginia, the Virginia Attorney General’s office, the Civil Division of the Justice Department, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Inspector General and the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit.
This resolution is part of the government’s emphasis on combating health care fraud and another step for the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) initiative, which was announced by Attorney General Eric Holder and Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services in May 2009. The partnership between the two departments has focused efforts to reduce and prevent Medicare and Medicaid financial fraud through enhanced cooperation. One of the most powerful tools in that effort is the False Claims Act, which the Justice Department has used to recover $6.7 billion since January 2009 in cases involving fraud against federal health care programs. The Justice Department’s total recoveries in False Claims Act cases since January 2009 are more than $9 billion.
Contact: Department of Justice Main Switchboard - 202-514-2000
Reported by: US Department of Justice
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