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Parents Rescue Daughter in Samoa:
Aurora Family Sends Teen to Academy for Depression but Finds Abuse
Instead
Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO); 8/18/2001; Kilzer, Lou
Byline: Lou Kilzer News Staff Writer
Rex and Teresa
Williamson wanted only the best for their daughter, Riley.
But Riley was
17 and in trouble. Three times hospitalized for depression, she was
self-destructing.
She had been a
good kid who made the honor roll her first two high school years.
She didn't smoke, drink or break the law.
But last April,
her grades were down and she was spiraling into an ever-deepening
funk.
``My mom just
felt she just couldn't handle me anymore,'' Riley recalled.
The
Williamsons, who live with their five children in Aurora, were
desperate. They checked out various programs for troubled teens in
the United States. Most would not take Riley because she was a high
risk.
Then an ad in
Sunset Magazine caught her parents' eye. The Pacific Coast
Academy in Samoa was offering help.
Soon the
Williamsons were in contact with a promoter named Stephen Cartisano,
a controversial former Utah wilderness trainer whose programs in six
countries have been shut down or accused of abuse.
The Williamsons
didn't know any of that, however. Instead, they say they listened to
a bubbly Cartisano, who said the Samoa program had great teachers
and psychologists and was very caring.
It was, he
said, a totally accredited academy.
``This isn't
boot camp,'' they say he said.
Riley, herself,
took a shine to Cartisano.
He told her she
``could learn to fly, work on cars, (take) survival training, have a
chance to fix airplanes or whatever,'' she said.
Knowing that
her ``self-esteem was trashed'' and she really needed help, Riley
grew excited.
The Williamsons
called references and were given glowing reports. They looked at
brochures that said the academy had a staff that included
physicians and psychologists. One showed kids living on a beautiful
beach.
Cartisano said
that Riley qualified for a $10,000 scholarship and could attend the
academy for only $2,000 a month, the Williamsons said.
On May 1, Riley
headed for Western Samoa.
Upon arrival, a
boy told her, ``Everything you heard, don't believe in any of it,''
she said.
She was
strip-searched by other girls in the program, something that shocked
her. Then she found herself at the compound. It was in a mountain
jungle off some dirt roads.
The program's
director, she said, told her: ``I don't care about your comfort. I
don't care about your well-being.''
She burst into
tears.
For some of the
kids, the discipline was severe, Riley said. She says she saw boys
beaten. Others reported sexual abuse. Riley says she became a
``suck-up,'' who followed the stringent rules to get sent home.
``It's
basically your survival,'' she said.
There were no
doctors or psychologists. There were teachers who spoke little
English. There were two people called therapists, one of whom Riley
liked a lot. But that therapist soon quit.
There was a
nurse, but she also quit. Riley found herself assigned
responsibility for dispensing medications to other children.
Riley busied
herself studying school subjects she had already taken and writing
home. The compound didn't censor her letters, and soon the
Williamsons were wondering what they were paying for.
They say they
called Cartisano and were told that kids were manipulating - a word
used frequently in this and other foreign behavior-modification
compounds, such as those associated with Teen Help, a Utah-based
organization.
Not satisfied,
the Williamsons decided to go to Samoa and investigate.
But before they
left Denver on July 24, they got a call from the American Embassy.
There had been allegations of abuse, they were told. Twenty-three
kids had been removed by the embassy and were staying in a hotel.
Riley was one
of them.
The owners of
Pacific Coast Academy did not return phone
calls from the Rocky Mountain News. But Cartisano and others
associated with the compound have been quoted by other publications
as saying that the stories of abuse and sexual assault were made up
by the kids to manipulate their parents.
Several parents
wrote to the embassy in support of Pacific Coast
Academy demanding that their children be returned there.
``Failure to comply with this request will result in serious legal
action,'' one letter to the embassy said.
The Williamsons
said that Riley had never been a liar or manipulator. Her problem
was depression. For that problem, she was getting nothing from the
academy.
They took Riley
out, first going on a vacation to Australia and New Zealand, then
returning to the metro area last Sunday.
Riley now is
stabilized on medications. She plans to attend Smoky Hill High
School for her senior year.
She remembers
what she felt the first day in Samoa: ``When I first got there, I
hit the Bible, saying, ``Oh God, save me.' ''
She believes he
did.
Now she says
she is ready to go on. She knows she may never kick depression, but
she and her family are determined to work through it.
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