Theater of the Soul

Six Camp Counselors Charged With Murder In Boy’s Death

CLEVELAND, Ga. — Murder, cruelty and manslaughter charges have been filed against six counselors at a camp for troubled boys in the northern Georgia mountains.

The counselors are accused of restraining a 13-year-old boy face-down and denying the boy his asthma inhaler. He died the next day.

I worked in a rehabilitative juvenile facility for almost 8 years and, although this kind of stuff never happened where I worked, I’ve seen things get out of control several times at other facilities that I worked at. I was a supervisor at my facility, but since we had other branches all over the eastern seaboard, I’d sometimes have to provide coverage in other cities. I’ve seen a 250lbs counselor sitting on a 12 year old kid because the counselor never recieved proper training. I’ve seen it take 4 full grown women pounce on a 14 year old girl who, although she wasn’t being compliant, was posing no threat to herself or anyone. You only ever put a kid in a restraint if he/she is being a danger to themselves or someone else. I’ve seen a male counselor get frustrated and almost grind a kid’s face into the floor in the middle of a restraint because the kid spit at him. He caught himself, but it was obvious that he wasn’t prepared for the job. These facilities literally hire anyone as long they pass a criminal record and background check because the turnover rate is so high. Burnout runs rampant, which is why I no longer wish to work with troubled kids or foster parent (I was a specialized foster parent for 5 years).

I learned how to perform restraints on out-of-control kids from people who had absolutely NO clue what the hell they were doing. The practice sessions were treated more like a joke than anything else. You don’t learn how difficult it is to restrain a kid from practicing on your fellow counselors who are treating the whole thing like a joke, so my first physical restraint was a huge eye opener. It was only when I took a class from the Department of Juvenile Justice that I received any useful training in the use of restraint methods, but no one at my workplace was required to take it. I took it because I was also working towards a job with the state’s Juvenile Justice division.

A textbook physical restraint includes one staff member on each of the kid’s extremeties and one staff member supervising. That’s 5 staff members total to control ONE kid. It just doesn’t happen that way when you only have 6 staff members on duty at a time (where I worked). The kid is also ALWAYS supposed to be on his back once he’s on the floor, in a spread eagle position. The Department of Juvenile Justice passed a law quite a while back prohibiting the use of ‘basket restraints’, where the child’s arms are crossed in front of their chest, then placed face down and counselors literally sit on them. In around 80% of the restraints I did or supervised, we used the approved method. But there were a few kids who you’d swear were made out of rubber and could get themselves twisted and contorted into some of the most creative positions ever. And then there were the spitters and the biters. And the pukers, who obviously couldn’t be kept on their backs in case they choked. We’d never use a basket restraint, but sometimes, no matter what we did, we’d end up in a face down spread eagle restraint. Still, I find it unusual that the cause of death for this 13 year old would be the restraint, given that the kid was alive until the next day, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised.

The article then goes on to say that the boy had been denied food and his inhaler. That would be a HUGE fuck up if that’s what actually occurred. In my facility, if a kid was acting up so badly that he needed to be isolated, food was offered…ONCE. If the kid threw the food or refused to eat, that was their loss, but food was NEVER withheld. Allowing access to a doctor prescribed medication is a no-brainer. Unfortunately, most kids have been allowed to use their inhalers whenever they feel like it, but once they’re in care, the meds are confiscated and counselors are taught to follow the directions on the prescription to the letter. If the kid had already used the inhaler once, or if the counselors didn’t believe him when he was in the midst of a hissy fit that he needed it, I’m not surprised that there was a fuck up. One of the things I always did was to be on the look out for lips or extremeties turning blue during a restraint if the kid was saying he couldn’t breathe and had a history of asthma. But no one ever taught me that…it was common sense to me.

These facilities aren’t a chamber of horrors like they’re so often made out to be, but there are a few bad eggs out there that should make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. The outdoor programs are the worst, in my opinion. It’s difficult enough to follow the rules of handling juvenile inmates in a controlled environment. I can’t imagine trying to maintain order within a group of delinquents AND try to keep them safe in the wilderness on top of that.

Taking a group of troubled kids who already have little to no self control out into the wilderness, where there is also little accountability for staff members is an accident waiting to happen.