Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > Thayer Learning Center
14 Year old Dies at THAYER LEARNING CENTER
Anonymous:
Posted on Thu, Apr 21, 2005
Boot camp sues ex-employee
By Steve Rock The Kansas City Star
FIRST GLANCE
Thayer Learning Center said in its lawsuit that Timothy J Rocha breached an employee agreement and has attempted to steer customers and potential customers away from the boot camp.
A northwest Missouri boot camp has sued one of its most vocal critics, saying a former employee has cused "irreparable harm" and asking for more than $75,000.00 in damages.
Thayer Learning Center, a military-type home for about 100 troubled teens in Kidder, Mo., filed a lawsuit last week in Caldwell County Circuit Court against Timothy J Rocha os St. Joseph. Rocha, who made $9.00 an hour as a "sergeant," worked at Thayer from Aug. 28, 2004 until he was fired less than two weeks later.
In the lawsuit, Thayer said Rocha breached a signed employment agreement that stated he would not "divert, take away... or intervene with any present or future customer." Thayer alleges that Rocha has contacted customers and attempted - sometimes successfully - to steer them away from Thayer and that he appears to be using contact information that was unlawfully obtained. It also says Rocha "successfully diverted away potential customers" but doesn't specify how.
Thayer also asked the court to grant a temporary restraining order that would prohibit Rocha from contacting former, existing or potential clients.
Joseph Elliott, a St. Joseph attorney for Rocha, said Wednesday that he had no comment. Attorneys for Thayer could not be reached.
According to the lawsuit, Thayer "has experience a significant decrease in revenues" because of Rocha's actions. An accompanying plaintiff's document pegs those losses in the "thousands of dollars" and says the school "is in danger of losing more."
Rocha has been quoted in various news outlets, including The Kansas City Star, about his experience at Thayer. In a Dec. 19 report in The Star, he recalled his brief employment at Thayer and said he was stunned by what he thought were abusive practices.
"By the second day," he said at the time, "I was telling my wife, 'This isn't right.'"
He asked some students for their parents' names and phone numbers, an action that he said led to his firing. He called some of those parents and encouraged them to remove their children from Thayer.
Rocha filed two reports of alleged child abuse with CAldwell County sheriff's office in September, noting in one that a student had been placed in "half a chokehold" and that a Thayer employee then sat on the students's legs.
Thayer officials have called allegations of child abuse "ludicrous and false."
Rocha is also listed as a witness in a recent state investigative report, which was released to The Star last week. The investigation was conducted at the request of the Caldwell County sheriff's office after a 15-year-old student died in November. The final report contains documents sent from Thayer to the parent of a Thayer student, who in turn sent them to Rocha.
The documents suggest that the parent had contact with Rocha before removing her son from Thayer.
terrified_mother:
Tim Rocha is a hero. An everyday, man next door, hero. He saw an enormous wrong and has tried to make it right. The legal attack on him will not make the truth go away.
Antigen:
--- Quote ---On 2005-04-21 16:30:00, Anonymous wrote:
According to the lawsuit, Thayer "has experience a significant decrease in revenues" because of Rocha's actions.
--- End quote ---
Never mind the dead kid, the lawsuit and criminal investigation. No, those aren't the problem. Why, we kill kids all the time and still the industry grows and grows. Must be this one disgruntled employee. :roll:
I do not believe in the immortality of the individual, and I consider ethics to be an exclusively human concern with no superhuman authority behind it.
--Albert Einstein, German-born American physicist
--- End quote ---
Antigen:
--- Quote ---On 2005-04-21 16:30:00, Anonymous wrote:
Rocha is also listed as a witness in a recent state investigative report, which was released to The Star last week.
--- End quote ---
Can you say "wittness tampering?" Sure! I knew ya' could! :rofl:
science is the record of dead religions.
--Oscar Wilde
--- End quote ---
Anonymous:
Parents, staff denounce Thayer Learning Center
By Ray Scherer
rscherer@npgco.com
St. Joseph News Press
May 1, 2005
Three weeks after its release, a state report on the death of a teen boot camp cadet continues to spawn reaction among parents and former workers.
The Missouri Department of Social Services investigation concluded that Thayer Learning Center's failure to offer medical care to
15-year-old Roberto Reyes contributed to his death -most likely from a brown recluse spider bite - in November Roberto's parents, Gracia and Victor Reyes, subsequently filed a wtrong-ful death lawsuit against the camp.
Meanwhile, Caldwell County Prosecutor Jason Kanoy has yet to decide whether he will file charges based on the report's findings. Mr. Kanoy was out of his courthouse office last week and unavailable for comment.
An initial status review for the lawsuit is set for Wednesday morning before Buchanan County Circuit Court Judge Weldon Judah. It's estimated that a jury trial would last two weeks.
In the interim, two more parents and a former worker contacted by the News-Press offered personal stories on their experiences with Thayer. Their versions of what happened at the camp add to accounts of physical abuse and
medial negligence reviewed in the Reyes' report.
Karen Avera of Texas decided to pull her son, Ryan, out of Thayer after only one week in January. News of Roberto's death contributed to her decision.
Her arrival at the camp to retrieve Ryan worried her even more. He was covered in cuts and bruises and was hopping on one foot, she said. His face had a sunken appearance and he had lost 10 to 15 pounds in his brief saty.
"I was completely shocked at what I saw," Ms. Avera said. "He looked so bad. As far as he knew he was going to a boarding school."
Officials refused to offer medical treatment for a fractured left ankle, she said. She also alleged that at one point, Ryan was tied to another student and dragged across a shower floor.
Ms. Avera said he witnessed other students being abused. An example of abuse she cited were students being force fed.
"There was one other child there who was getting it even worse than my son was," she said.
Sue Warner of Connecticut became so concerned and uncomfortable that she decided to remoce her son, Justin. Justin, who stayed at Thayer for four months, came down with a high fever at one point. He wasn't taken to see a docotr and staff only gave Tylenol to help alleviate the condition, she said.
"He was medically neglected," Ms. Warner said.
Besides being ill for a week, Justin was forced to endure manatory exercise drills despite soreness.
"They continued to make him run, even though his knees hurt him," Ms Warner said.
The abuse wasn't limited to physical means, she said.
"One of the sergeants was calling my son a gang member," Ms. Warner said.
In another incident, Justin was unsuccessful in disaproving a staff claim that he stole muffins.
Ms. Warner admitted being naive at first kept her from becoming alarmed about Thayer. Now, she offers support to other parents of ex-students.
One of the school's former drill sergeants, Ed Black, said staff would occasionally resort to certain tactics to punish all cadets for one person's mistake.
"It was a common practice to deprive the children of sleep," Mr. Black said. "They would routinely wake them up in the middle of the night and have what they called a 'smoke session' as a way of punishment... During a smoke session, they would have the children doing push-ups, mountain climbers, eight-counts, sit-ups, leg lifts or running. Some of the children ran until they fell out. At that time, the drill instructor would get in the cadet's face and start yelling at them to stop the theatrics and get up and exercise."
No matter what, Mr. Black said, "the drill instructors wanted the sergeants to yell at the cadets all the time. But they also wanted you to praise them while they were being punished."
The smoke sessions could last as long as three to four hours, Mr. Black said.
State investigators said Roberto was ordered to wear a 20-pound sandbag around his neck as punishment for not participating in exercises.
"Everybody thought he was just lazy," one drill sergeant said in an interview conducted by a state social services team.
Willa Bundy, one of Thayer's owners, told investigators that Roberto would encourage disobedience amoung other students.
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