Elan (corporation/school)

[Matt C. Hoffman]

It appears that the media has been made aware of Elan .Yet N.B.C. cannot present an unbiased reporting of this place located in Poland Springs Maine.

Dan Abrams ,the legal analyst for nbc had a brother that was there during '74-'76 when things were really out of control.Allan Maraynes  did a very flattering story on Joe Ricci for 60 minutes who now works for dateline.

Dateline  and NBC refuse to expose Elan for the brutal and sadistic acts that were perpetrated by men that had absolute power over the residents.

These men were Joe Ricci ,Peter McCann, Jeffery Gottlieb,Martin Kruglik and Ken Zaretsky

The New Yorker(7-3-00) had an article by J.Tobin where Kruglik was quoted from the witness stand as saying that elan is not a brutal place .

Elan was a horribly sick , twisted and brutal place.

It would behoove these media organazations to do an unbiased reporting of Elan and to expose the crimes against humanity that these men executed against good decent human beings,instead of turning a blind eye and doing a grave disservice to society.

It is a shame that it took the murder investagation of M. Skakel to bring Elan to the publics attention ,and more shame on how these news organazations have handled Elan.

Details magazine (October issue) had a four page article that did a little more in depth reporting yet still managed to sugarcoat Elan . Most of the source for their story came from K. Zaretzky a (in my opionin) true pathological sociopath.Go figure.

[Anonymous]

while i agree with you on many points heres one you have forgotten werent we all in the same boat RESIDENTS at one time! so who blames who here? who started it all? dose anyone know for sure? whatever the case may be we should remeber that whatever our views may be that respect should play a role after all we did all go through the same shit we just see things differently

[Anonymous]

My name is Michael Pelella. I attended Elan from 3-16-1999 until 8-11-2000. I am more then willing to talk to any one about Elan (cause god knows we all have our own opinions on that place.) and I love hearing from Elan students. Here is my e-mail - [email protected] Hope to talk to you ALL soon!

[Anonymous]

I'm tired of  hearing all this on how elan was so bad, I am a graduate from there, and I found that none of what i saw there was considered burtal or sadistic. what i did find was it was safer than the enviroments that we came from. How many people die on the streets each day, how many people are hurt so badly that it leaves them physicaly and emotionaly handicaped? If you saw elan as such a bad place what did you do there to make it better? what did you do to change it. When i arrived at Elan 3 it was in cahos and filled with coruptions,but the peer before me and my peer worked hard to change that. and we did. what did you do to change the way you lived there? people who complaine about it didn't to anything, you speak words yet do nothing, It's a micro government in there, if you choose only to complain what does that change? just in anygovernment, complaints do nothing, it is those who act and push foward are those who change the way things are. As far as i can see , YOU ARE WEAK. so why do you complaine now when you had a chance to change things earlier? Grow a spine!

[velvet2000]

Hey, it's the AARCsurvivor girl. I was just checking out this forum; I've read a bit about Elan before. Course nothing confirms that one of these schools is a bad place untill some anonymous poster comes in and tells everyone that they are weak if they disagree with the facilites ways. It's funny how these angry posters who visit all of these boards all sound so similar. They're like robots, doing what they're programmed to do, no individual thought put into it.

Keep making yourself heard survivors, take care.

    Velvet.

[Antigen]

"...but the almighty dollar is the bottom line here as always!"

Yeah, that's the golden rule. He who has the gold makes the rules. That has been so since time out of mind and will continue to be so.

So the most sensible thing to do is to take away their gold Most of the money comes from public funding sources. That may seem hard to believe in light of the exorbitant fees and donations.

But think about it. Right now, DFAF is planning a conference in Vancouver to do a little (more) fear mongering there. (See IDEAS-CANADA) I've met a LOT of Program parents over the years. Most of them are among the most decent people in the world. What would posess them to do to us what they did? How about a multi-billion-dollar, decades long propaganda campaign???

We MUST cut off this line of funding. It is, after all, our money. When we were kids, it was our parents' responsibility. They were duped or negligent or just still shell-shocked from the war era. Now it's up to us to take charge of public policy and route these sleazy bastards from the public dole. The private sector dollars will fall off just as soon as the public support is curtailed.

[Anonymous]

To asshole who posted 3/23 you obviously bought into Joe's bullshit(may he rot) but you preach it to well to just be a class of 2000 graduate I'll bet you are a member of the staff or former member anyway Ken nobody here wan't to hear your sick concept bullshit.

[Anonymous]

Elan School has saved the lives of several kids I know.  All of them are living productive lives now, and are close to their families. All have gone on to college.  One is getting married now.  One is working in hospital administration, the others are still in college, and one is going to a regular high school. All of these kids were out of control, engaging in dangerous behavior, and failing in school before they came to Elan. As the parent of an Elan student, I have found the staff, the students who have been my daughter's friends at Elan, and the teachers and administrators there to be caring, respectful people doing a very hard job.  I have visited at Elan during the confrontation groups.  I overheard strong language used, very intense and hard to hear.  It shook me up. But I have seen kids come out of these groups feeling better, and feeling close to their peers who were just yelling at them for something offensive they had done.  There are tough kids there, kids for whom school and home environments have not worked out well.  After the Elan program,these kids have been able to leave Elan and go home to finish high school, go to college, or go to a regular boarding school.  A minor percentage of kids do not succeed at Elan, and leave without graduating.  Fortunately, most do succeed.  As the parent of a teenager who has benefitted immeasurably from her stay at Elan, I would be happy to answer any questions about Elan you may have. I am grateful to Elan, as is my daughter.  She has thanked me many times for choosing Elan for her.  She has recommended Elan for a friend of our family's. That says a lot.    K.

[lpayne]

You don't know what you are talking about (says respectively).  The Elan I knew was nothing like what you have described.  I am very happy that you had a great experience, but that was not my Elan 23 years ago.  It was so damaging to me and took many years to recover.  I believe I was only 1 of a few that ever escaped and the fact that I survived had nothing to do with Elan.

[lpayne]

I am a survivor of Elan.  I was there...oh some 23 years ago.  There is no one that can convince me that Elan was anything but corrupt.  I was there.  I saw it.  I remember when I was there, there were a couple of kids that tried to runaway or something and they had to sit in bunny suits all day and handcuffed.  I remember the boxing ring/blood.  I remember the customes and signs.  I remember the constant yelling and screaming and knocking on doors.  I remember the termoil of my peers. I remember most of all that I could trust no one.  I was so alone and knew that Elan was going to destroy me, I wanted out in the worst way.  I felt as though Elan was stealing my soul and spirit.  I played the game real well though and stayed basically out of any real trouble there.  But as you all know, that didn't always work.  They made sure everyone got a fair shake at their "therapy".  Anyway, I finally got them to take me on a trip with others to the mall and by this time, because I stayed out of trouble, they took their eyes off of me for only a minute and I was gone.  I left Maine and went to Boulder, got a job, an apartment, got married years later, went back to school, raised my son (who just graduated high school last week).  SCREW you all anonymous fakes, that can't even post who you are.  I don't feel this way about many, but Ricci...I was so glad to hear that he was gone.  I was relieved.  The world is a much better place without him.  What a sad statment on his life.  I mean look at all of us..I'm 37 and while I'm by no means consumed with Elan anymore....the pain is still there in some degree...I WILL NEVER FORGET.  And for those of you who have said...well what did you do to make it better.  Elan sucked...nothing can make that better.  What I've done is raised a healthy son...who dabbled at 14 in drugs/drinking and the black clothes and when told that either I put him somewhere or they will not continue to treat him for his ADHD, I said fine...he is not a car I'm sending to get fixed.  He is my son.  Why anyone thinks that you can send away your child to be fixed is beyond me.  I worked with my son, we both made changes and we're here to say that places like Elan should be eliminated.  That is more of a contribution than thinking that you made Elan a better place.  You are sick!

I AM A SURVIVOR!

[Matt C. Hoffman]

L Payne ,

you were very lucky to have escaped .I remember Two kids that escaped without their shoes in the middle of a Maine winter .(talk about desperate young people ) They did what they had to do and got severe frost bite .

They made it as far as Vermont  (by way of a car that they later stole )and were caught by the police in some little town in Vermont.

They were not as fortunate , Robert C. and myself went to go pick them up,and bring them back to hell (oh I mean elan ),and hell is what these 2 kids went thru .

Infact anyone who escaped (and not returned to that place )were blessed .

(continued) Peace to you

Matthiam

[nick]

i agree with those who advocate elan and i really feel that those who hate elan so much should move on with life and stop focussing on your past if it was so horrible.a rape victim is advised to do the same or life will seem not worth living.the bottom line is elan helped far more people than not or who ever owns this web sight would be very wealthy.if some of these stories i read are true then i am truly sorry for those people.i feel like a lot of it is fabricated by spoiled kids that had such a hard time at elan because they did not want to comply with the program.

[Anonymous]

ok, its very clear  to me that there are 2 schools,  im,  not sure where line is drawn,, lets say   87. the ones who went after that seem to have a totally diff story to tellheres my analogy,,,, to guys are sitting at a bar, both have been ass raped recently, 1 by a mouse, the other by a horse,,,,the mouse guys says ,, ya i been assraped, but it wasnt that bad, what are u bitchin bout u idiot,, while the guy that was fucked by a horse can only groan,,,,,, :smokin:

[Anonymous]

This site is for us to vent any hostility we want towards them.If you dont like what you read then dont read it.No one is forcing you to read it.

[Anonymous]

Oh, is that what this site is for? That sounds like an encounter group, doesn't it?. Well, then why don't we vent real hostility instead of making up silly stories about pedophiles and the like?