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American, Canadian teens removed from Samoan reform
camp amid abuse allegations
Nando Times/July 22, 2001
APIA, Samoa -- Allegations of sexual, physical and mental abuse
led to the removal of 23 American and Canadian teens from a center
for troubled youths reportedly run by a man who was banned from
operating teen-reform survival camps in the United States following
the death of a girl in his care.
Reports made by the teens to the U.S. Embassy over the past three
weeks "were very serious and were coherent, credible and
consistent," said James A. Derrick, the charge d'affaires at the
embassy. "We were able to verify many to our satisfaction," Derrick
said. "We are interviewing the students and if we receive credible
information of specific crimes we will pass it on to the appropriate
authorities of the Samoan government."
The attorney general's office said the "serious, credible
complaints" are being investigated by police. Specific allegations
weren't disclosed by officials investigating the program, which has
an unlisted telephone number. The 22 Americans and one Canadian were
housed in a motel after being removed Thursday. They spent Friday at
the embassy contacting their parents to make arrangements to return
home.
Most of the teens are from the southwestern part of the United
States, Derrick said. Embassy officials, along with officials from
the High Commissioner of Australia, representing Canada, visited the
Pacific Coast Academy on Friday along with police officers, Health
Department staff and a lawyer from the attorney general's office.
The Samoa Observer reported the rehabilitation center is owned by
Steve Cartisano, who was banned from operating teen-reform survival
camps in Utah following the death of a girl in his care.
Cartisano gained notoriety after founding Challenger Foundation,
a successful adolescent "wilderness therapy" program in the late
1980s. But charges of child abuse and negligent homicide -
16-year-old Kristen Chase died of heat exhaustion in 1990 while on a
forced hike in Kane County, Utah - closed the program.
Cartisano was acquitted of criminal charges. His name landed on
Utah's registry of suspected child abusers in 1992, barring him from
working for any state-licensed child-treatment facility in the
state. Cartisano also was linked to another center for troubled
American youths in Samoa.
He was hired by several Utah businessmen in 1998 to help start
the New Hope Academy. In the two weeks Cartisano ran New Hope,
company officials allege he wrote $23,000 in bad checks and ran up a
$10,000 cellular phone bill. In 1999, New Hope closed its doors,
reportedly stranding five youths in the South Pacific island nation,
located 2,300 miles south of Hawaii.
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