May 14, 2024 • 50 mins
Kirby recounts the four years she spent at Cross Creek Manor, Robert Lichfield's first program in La Verkin, Utah. The details of the treatment model begin to take shape and enrollment explodes as Robert’s brother - Narvin Litchfield - gets involved.
To learn more and get involved, head to TrappedInTreatment.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The following episode contains disturbing and graphic accounts of survivor experiences.
It may not be suitable for younger audiences. Please listen
with care.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
From iHeartRadio London Audio and executive producer Paris Hilton. This
is Trapped in Treatment. We're your hosts. I'm Rebecca Mellinger Brown.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
And I'm Caroline Cole. Join us on our journey to
uncover the hidden truths of an industry shrouded in scandal.
We're on a mission to make sure that no child
has to experience the hell that is the troubled teen industry.
But we're also on a quest to uncover why justice
has not been served for so many of these survivors.
(00:52):
This season is all about WASP, the Worldwide Association of
Specialty Programs and Schools of the the largest networks of
troubled teen programs in the industry, masterminded by one man,
Robert Litchfield. The stories you will hear in the following
episode are the personal allegations and accounts of individuals who
(01:15):
have attended treatment at one of these programs. All experiences, views,
and opinions are their own. To protect their identities, some
names have been changed.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Last week on Trapped in Treatment, we heard the story
of Tony, a young boy abused by his stepmother and
sent to Majestic Ranch, the facility opened by Robert Litchfield's
brother in law, Dan Peered. We also heard from Brittany,
a dorm parent there. According to former staff and students
who attended Majestic Ranch, the children were forced into hard
(01:50):
labor with little understanding of how this was supposed to
help them. Litchfield was the inspiration behind Majestic after convincing
his brother in law that this was a lucrative opportunity.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
And depending on whatever they were doing that day for ADAPT,
you know, then that's where the kid would be sent.
And sometimes it was to the maneuver pile to shovel manure,
and just stand in the poop pile and just shovel
poop till that staff member running ADAPT felt that they
were done, and a lot of the kids didn't. They
(02:25):
didn't want to shovel poop. Nobody wants to stand and
shovel poop.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
After leaving Provocanian School, Lichfield attended a seminar called Keys
to Success, which laid the groundwork for so much of
wasp's ideology. He and two of the facilitators he met
at the seminar, including Dwayne Smotherman, started working together and
from there Lichfield had a unique model that he could
sell to vulnerable parents. He was off to the races
(02:54):
and opened his first program, Cross Creek Manor for Girls
in Laverk in Utah. Before we dive into the survivor
stories about Cross Creek, we feel it's important to explain
how the program was set up based on stories we've heard.
For many new students, learning the ropes of the program
feels like being on another planet, unlike anything they've experienced before.
(03:18):
We got Dwayne Smotherman, the seminar facilitator we heard from
an episode two, to explain to us the program Lichfield created.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
When those schools we were created, they wanted to have
a way to measure progress, and so they developed a
level system, a one through six level system. So the
kids immediately had certain kinds of goals and metrics that
(03:47):
they had to achieve in order to make progress or
they would just be stagnant. And that's how we measured it,
you know, and that's how we measure it in a
big part of that was, for example, the privilege of
family visits where would you know, just get together the
mom and dad and whomever in the family. In the
great part of that is that the kids were incentivized
(04:08):
from the very beginning to do better, to let go
of a lot of the behaviors and the attitude that
they had had that got them into the program in
the first place.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Moving up in levels was important because that was the
only way to earn your way home. Survivors have stated
that gaining levels was difficult. Participants had to go through
an approval process consisting of your peers, staff and upper administration.
Chelsea Filer, the survivor and activist we heard from an
episode one, elaborates more on the program structure.
Speaker 5 (04:41):
We had a level system, and this would be where
the upper levels would essentially be policing the lower levels,
and that was you know, kids that had been there
longer and moved up in the levels based on a
point system. And that point system, very much like a game,
(05:03):
was that you needed to try to get points so
that you could earn your rights back and basic privileges.
Privileges like being able to speak to other people, being
able to call your parents, even eat condiments at dinner
and a candy bar once in a while.
Speaker 6 (05:23):
And you know, these.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Upper levels, the junior staff, essentially were tasked with taking
your points away. They would watch you like a hawk
and give you consequences for any rule violation. Now, those
rules were really strict. Some of them were just totally asinine.
(05:48):
Other ones were just abuses, abusive in and of themselves.
We weren't allowed to speak to each other, we weren't
allowed to speak without permission. We couldn't look out the window,
we couldn't even nonverbally communicate to each other. And you know,
(06:08):
a lot of things were just way too strict, to
the point that there would it would be really difficult
to be able to follow those rules themselves.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Those so called privileges are things that so many of
us take for granted on a day to day basis,
things as simple as calling your parents, looking out the window,
or using the restroom in private. But here at Cross
Creek and so many other WASP facilities, those everyday details
that can seem so trivial were actually something to strive for.
(06:46):
To us, at least, it feels like any semblance of
individuality or autonomy was stripped away the moment these children
walked through the door. Instead, identities seemingly revolved around a
point system. Advancing in the program was difficult, especially when
both peers and staff were watching your every move. Gaining
(07:08):
levels was not a linear path. Sometimes students would lose
levels or have to start their program over from the
very beginning, no matter how long they had been there.
But more than that, the program wanted to see that
the kids were willing to leave everything from their past behind,
including their own identity. They called this getting out of
(07:29):
your image. Here's Dwayne.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
I mean, you know, the image issues dealt with anything
from you know, the music you listened to, the clothes
you wore, the friends you hung out with. You know,
you had kids where you know we're coming from, you know,
really affluent areas, a lot of them between from affluent areas,
attempting to look like they were these ghetto, inner city
(07:53):
kids with all the talk on the walk and so
forth and so on, and so, I mean, you know,
the only to let go of that and to deal
with that was a big, big part of the progress
of the program.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Dwayne told us that the purpose was to get the
kids out of their current image, to revert them back
to who they were before they headed down the wrong
path to do that. First, they had to label their image.
Were they a prep, a goth, a thug? Then they
were forced to shed this image permanently, as Dwayne puts it.
(08:26):
If they didn't, they weren't working the program, and they
weren't ready to go home.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
And for some of the teens it took longer than others.
Others it was a shock for them to be out
of their home, out of their environment with their friends
and so forth, and they had of all their comings
and goings, and it was a shock them. So they
really got on the horse and worked really hard.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
How did it get to a point where parents were
choosing to subject their kids to treatment like this? Based
on our research for this podcast, the answer seems to
lie in WASPS. Sophisticated and strategic marketing. WASP captured the
attention and trust of parents, convincing them to send their
kids to these programs. Parents like Lindsay's.
Speaker 7 (09:11):
I grew up in northern California. I had a pretty
good childhood. I was an only child, you know, I
was My parents were very involved in my upbringing and
recreational type things, you know, sports and ballet and things
like that. They were very good parents. I would say,
I'd had a very uneventful childhood mostly. And then as
(09:34):
I went into middle school, I had a friend that
I started hanging out with that was kind of from
a different situation, and you know, her parents got her
into drugs and things like that very early on, things
that I had never been exposed to because my parents
wanted me to be like a poster child. So I
(09:56):
think that was what started setting off alarms for them.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Lindsay's new friend, it may not have been an ideal choice,
but she never actually did drugs or anything really except
having the wrong friend group in her parents' eyes.
Speaker 7 (10:09):
When I was in I think I was a sophomore
in high school when they decided to send me to
a boss program, and I had been hanging out with
like some gothy kids that were kind of into that scene.
And it was actually, like I said, I was sent
there in May of ninety nine. It was the Columbine
shooting that happened that my parents thought that somehow, I
(10:34):
don't know if you remember all that media hype back then,
but there was a lot of stuff about a trench
coat mafia, and like people thought that it was like
a like a I don't know, a worldwide thing or something,
but it was really just pertained to that one school,
and my parents were like, she's hanging out with people
who dress like that, so they must be up to
(10:54):
the same kind of stuff. And I think that was
what kind of made them, you.
Speaker 6 (10:59):
Know, pulled.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Lindsey would be sent to Cross Creek Manor First.
Speaker 7 (11:05):
I was actually one of the few that my parents
are actually straight up with me about it, telling me
that this was kind of a disciplinary you know action
they were commit like doing here by sending me that
to this program, but they definitely didn't know what it
was really like. I mean, they made it sound very
(11:27):
different than what it was in actuality.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Lindsay told us that her parents had discovered the program
in a local magazine.
Speaker 7 (11:36):
I believe it was in the back of a Sunset magazine.
There's all kinds of ads for homewares, and then all
of a sudden, there's this is your child out of control,
you know, sort of in one of those marketing ads.
West tended to have a lot of ads that made
the place look like, you know, it's a summer camp.
(12:00):
You're going to raise bunnies and learn agriculture, and you know,
so my parents kind of looked at that and they thought, well,
this would be a nice little retreat for her. You know.
They really had no idea what was really going on,
which is the story with most parents.
Speaker 6 (12:14):
I think.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
The infamous Sunset magazine ad Duyne Smotherman remembers these ads vividly.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
If you looked in the back of Sunset magazine back
in the day, there was these advertisements for all these
schools in the back of the magazine, which was really
kind of funny because Sunset was like a home decor
environmental kind of magazine with all these great pictures and
landscapes and so forth, and then you look in the
back and there's all these advertisements for these the all
these schools, and they arranged from a military style schools
(12:50):
that were based on a control element, to schools that
were just simply almost like a day camp, kind of
almost like a spa for teens, if you will.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Whether Dwayne realized it or not, many of these advertisements
were strategic for Dan Peart's ranch. They initially started with
traditional ads. Here's another clip from the twenty eleven University
of Utah Archives Oral History interview of Dan Peart, which
gives us some insight into the evolution of Lichfield's marketing plan.
Speaker 8 (13:25):
Well, we used to advertise in Sunset magazine and that's
how we first started. And then we'd get out and
beat the bushes and work with therapists and guidance counselors
and then they'd prefer and then the Internet come along,
and that's when it exploded.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
And that's the moment that Narvin, Robert's brother, really got involved.
In nineteen ninety one, Robert Litchfield had started a marketing
company called teen Help, a company that would become the
cornerstone of his marketing strategy for the WASP network of
proke rams.
Speaker 9 (14:01):
Yeah, my older brother had added teen ol and I
basically was you know, I was the person who hired
the staff and trained the staff.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
And Narvin was recently out of college with a degree
in sociology and working with his brother came at the
opportune moment thanks to the power of the newly burgeoning
Internet when I graduated.
Speaker 6 (14:23):
Literally he asked me to come right down.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
Take over his marketing because he just didn't the market and.
Speaker 9 (14:33):
So we I came down and we took over and
they were probably doing two kids for a month two
three kids per month as far as admissions, and the
first month of my admissions I did sixteen kids and
then we averaged about twenty five kids.
Speaker 8 (14:52):
And I have a unique.
Speaker 9 (14:55):
Ability to, for whatever reason, to.
Speaker 6 (15:00):
To be good on the phone.
Speaker 9 (15:01):
And our psychiatrist W. D. Belnapp, who was an amazing being,
helped us establish a lot of things that we did.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
W D.
Speaker 9 (15:12):
Bell said, he said, Narvin, you're the best ever heard
on the phone. You're You're very good getting the confidence
of their parents because you're a knowledge ex And then
you know, I guess I'm a salesman in some form.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
So in the length of my.
Speaker 9 (15:30):
Running the marketing with two different marketing companies that we
established what we became the biggest in the world.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
This was the early days of the Internet. Most people
didn't have emails, let alone in online marketing strategy, especially
not one aimed at funneling kids out of their community
and into facilities in far off lands.
Speaker 9 (15:53):
Yes, I am al Gore. I did invent the Internet.
I'm just telling you up front. We were the first
real thing on the Internet actually making money. I had
a friend from high school who felt impressed. Again, you know,
I have a spiritual aspect of my life. Who felt
impressed to come and visit me in Saint George, Utah.
(16:14):
He had put up this mall on the internet in
nineteen ninety two or nineteen ninety three, and he came
to me and just said, I felt impressed. We hadn't
seen each other, and we serve lds missions and gone
to college and I both got married, and we hadn't
seen or done anything since high school. And he said,
(16:34):
I just felt impressed.
Speaker 6 (16:35):
I was supposed to come visit you. And he explained
what he was.
Speaker 4 (16:41):
Doing with the Internet.
Speaker 6 (16:42):
I had never even heard of the internet.
Speaker 9 (16:44):
Until he came explaining to it to me, because it
was just in the first stages of the Internet taking on,
and I saw it immediately for what it could do.
And so I hired him, secured all the websites for
our different entities, and then hired a guy that was
(17:04):
because you know, at that time, webs web call or
Alta Vista were the top you know, searchages, and they
were non dynamic. They were so simple to manipulate. It
was scary. I'm written up in so long magazine.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
If you won't get bored, look it up.
Speaker 6 (17:21):
They were mad at me.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
We looked it up, and what we found was eye opening.
Back in nineteen ninety eight, journalists were already drawing attention
to Robert's booming business. Of particular note were his methods
of Internet advertising. One critical article focused on trojan horse keywords,
hundreds of slightly different keywords that were invisible to the
(17:45):
normal web surfer at the time.
Speaker 6 (17:47):
So it's likely that.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Any parent who used certain terms in their searches like
help for my team, may have inadvertently found themselves directed
towards a WASP program website. This is called spamdexing, a
method of stuffing as many keywords as possible onto a
web page, a marketing tactic that became very popular until
(18:08):
major search engines began penalizing sites that did this. By
today's standards, Narvin's method would be considered a violation of
advertising ethics, as it would cause teen health and future
loss programs to be one of the dominant options that
would show up during a keyword search, but he felt
it was all fair game.
Speaker 9 (18:30):
When they would do a search for troubled kids or
services for troubled kids. My company was the first two
hundred entries, and they said this is not fair. I said,
Oh really, I think this is what this business is
is whoever can advertise the best is going to get
the most clients, you know, as far as we go.
(18:52):
And that's the whole point is to control of the
search engines. I mean, it's pretty obvious, isn't it now.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Once again an interesting word choice by Narvin, because that's
so much of what WASP programs are based on, a
form of control over powerless teens and children. The Internet
represented a new horizon and unprecedented expansion. But the deep
irony is that even though the Internet and its new
global footprint opened major doors for Lichfield's organization, it seems
(19:25):
as if some of these programs could not be further
from the modern world.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
For some people, a change of scenery would hardly mean
an escape from difficulties at home. Kirby, whose name we've
changed for legal reasons and to protect her privacy, was
just fourteen years old when she was sent away to
Cross Creek Manor. She shared with us that she had
a difficult childhood and had experienced a lot of trauma
(19:58):
by the time she arrived. The following is Kirby's recollection
of her childhood and her initial experiences at Cross Creek.
Speaker 6 (20:09):
So it's kind of funny because I kind of always
say the first five years of my life kind of
defined me later. I was born into a really bad
home with a mom that was severely addicted to drugs,
and she was engaged in prostitution and all that kind
of stuff, and that's how she got pregnant with me.
(20:31):
There were a lot of men coming in and out
of the home the first three years of my life.
I was sexually abused, like I'm not really sure how
many times. It's severe.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Kirby shared that when she was just three years old,
her mother and three of her mother's friends were arrested
and charged with the rape of a minor. Kirby says
she was sent away taken into the foster care system,
where she would spend the next three years of her life.
When a young couple with no children of their own
decided to adopt her, she hoped she might finally have
(21:07):
the kind of family she saw on TV.
Speaker 6 (21:10):
But then, but then my adoptive parents, who were my
next life, got really bored with being parents really quickly.
They wanted this little redhead doll to play with. I
think my mom, I think that she thought that I
was like this exciting toy, and she got bored really
(21:30):
quickly when I was a real person.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Her new guardians didn't live up to the fantasy that
she had held in her heart for so long.
Speaker 6 (21:39):
My parents were exceptionally strict and abusive. They locked me
in a room with a dead bowl all the time
I went to school and home and church, and I
didn't have friends. I didn't have toys, I didn't have belongings.
It was like prison.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
It didn't seem to matter how well behaved Kirby was
or how bright. She felt. Her new parents weren't in
in parenting, but they wouldn't let her go. According to Kirby,
they had other reasons for keeping her in their care.
Speaker 6 (22:09):
That my parents were paid a monthly stipend for my
care until I was eighteen, and in addition to my
medical and psychiatric care, so they a really nice way
to get me out of the way was to send
me away, and so they did that.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
After two stints and treatment centers. Kirby felt her adopted
parents had no intention of keeping her around. They traveled
as much as possible and would leave Kirby behind. She
says she treasured these trips because she could get to
stay with a couple that she had known since she
was little.
Speaker 6 (22:45):
My so, my parents would go on vacations and it
was one of the best times of my life because
they didn't want to bring me. My brother would go,
but they didn't want to bring me, so they would
send me to stay with friends. And I had this
foster family and this other couple that I lived with
that had known me since I was little, and I
would spend the summers there sometimes and it was heaven like.
(23:07):
It was my only time I got to be a
real kid.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
It was during one of these vacations that Kirby received
a hint that her next stretch and treatment might be
right around the corner.
Speaker 6 (23:20):
This really nice elderly lady. When I was at her house,
she told me that when I was going to fly
home to Boise because I was in Utah busying her,
she said that there might be people there to take
me somewhere and to not go.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Kirby returned to Boise on heightened alert, but she wasn't
taken away by transporters, as the elderly lady had warned. Instead,
her parents gave her a choice.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
They gave me two Broushures was for Provo Canyon. It
was called Provocanding Girls School at the time, and then
one for Crosskreek Manor and they said you pick well.
Crosstreet Manor looked amazing. There were horses and like a
giant Olympic swimming pool and like all these lovely girls
with books and I love books. That is, if you
(24:07):
wanted to catch me like a kid, people offer kid candy,
offer me books, and I will come running. It's a
trap for me. So I was just like, well, this
looks great. And they talked about academics, and I love
to learn and I'm a big nerd that way. So
I was like, yeah, this sounds great. I'll get away
from my parents. That did not work out the way anticipated.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Her parents drove her across the state borders to Laverkin
in Utah, and then left her there. If you were
to drive through the town of Laverkin, Utah, you may
miss it all together. It's a tiny city near the
Nevada Utah border that has a current population of around
four thousand. It's a dry and dusty place with one
(24:52):
main street, one supermarket, and mostly emptier rundown restaurants.
Speaker 6 (24:58):
It's it's like a one stop sign kind of town.
There's no nothing out there. It's red dirt and sage
brush and nothing. The people there, a lot of people
that live there, aren't even like high school graduates, like
there's there's not a lot of opportunities there for education
(25:19):
or jobs or upwards motility at all. It's all just
kind of like you're born here, you die here, and
they a lot of people never leave, and unfortunately that
kind of limits their worldview because that's the only experience
they have is kind of in this closed context.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
According to Kirby, most of the people there have lived
in laverc in their entire lives. Most never leave, but
sometimes new people would arrive. They were dropped off by
anxious parents or even delivered in handcuffs by transporters. They
were young, ranging in age from thirteen to seventeen, and
(25:55):
had no idea what was in store for them. Today,
many of these kids identify as survivors, but then they
were just scared and had no idea what they were
in for. Kirby spent four years of her life in
this desert town. The Cross Creek Manor Campus was at
(26:16):
the edge of town, at the base of a local
hill range. At the time, it was a series of
low lying white buildings with white gates guarding the entrance.
After Kirby arrived with her parents, she says, it seemed
like it might be like the brochures promised.
Speaker 6 (26:33):
I got there into this building and it looked really nice.
It had like pillars. It was like an old Greek
style column building, and it looked nice, like, well, this
wouldn't be too bad. There was a fountain, and I
remember all this tile and like fake plants.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
So far, so good, right, But then Kirby shares that
she noticed something odd.
Speaker 6 (26:59):
There was no one around. There were no kids or
other things, and I was like, that's weird.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Kirby's observation was telling. She quickly came to believe that
not all was as it seemed.
Speaker 6 (27:12):
What I didn't know at the time was that was
the parent friendly location that they would show the parents,
because it was a lot better looking compared to where
we actually spent our time. And so I was crying
and I'm like, I don't want to go to another
mental hospital. That's what I had called it, and they're like,
it's not a mental hospital. And then my parents left.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
According to Kirby. After her parents left, things quickly took
a turn for the worse. For legal reasons, we have
to note that these are her allegations, and no one
affiliated with WASP or Cross Creek have confirmed the following
allegations or ever been charged with or found guilty of
a crime stemming therefrom.
Speaker 10 (27:57):
Well.
Speaker 6 (27:57):
Immediately they put me in a van me to this
other building and that's called the rec Center, that's what
they called it. And it's this literal box, doesn't have windows,
it's just a box. And then behind it there's a
yard and it has chain link fences and barbed wire
across the top, and there's a kind of a little grasp,
(28:19):
but not really and there's just red dirt and that's
where the girls would walk. We called the yard. So
we got there and they put me immediately in an
isolation room they called them ISO. And it was awful.
It was carpeted Florida ceiling, and it smelled horribly like
(28:39):
urine and sweat and just you know, unwashed bodies that
really bad smell. And it was really overwhelming. And this
woman came in and she made me take all my
clothes off, and she felt between my legs and in
my backside and under my breasts, and she made me
(29:03):
lie down and put my legs up. And then a
man came in and did a pelsic exam. He did
not wear gloves. He had a very low cut shirt
and this necklace chain and I just remember that necklace
was like swinging in my face. It was very scary.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Kirby recounts that she was disoriented and scared, but tried
her best to adjust to her new surroundings.
Speaker 6 (29:30):
They didn't tell me the rules, they didn't tell me
what was expected of me. It was scary. And they
told me that it would be a six month, two
year program and that I just needed to work my
program and I could go home. And I was like, well,
I've done this before, I can do this and this
will be fine. And I knew there was no point
(29:52):
in crying. My parents didn't care, so I sucked it up.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Kirby was constantly on edge and seemingly made to believe
that everything in her life was of her own doing.
To me, at least, it sounds like a complex duality
of being wholly responsible for oneself and yet completely powerless
at the same time.
Speaker 6 (30:16):
Their premise is that you're accountable for every single thing
in your life, whether you trip over your own feet
or you anything that you do is your fault. And
they have these little cute sayings like that which is
not acted upon, as not learned or based on your results,
(30:40):
you have exactly what you intended. And they one of
the premises that they push is there are no accidents.
So every single thing that happens in your life, whether
by you or from another person, is directly your responsibility
and you have to take accountability for that.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
And as many of us can relate to, feeling anxious
and rushed leaves room for errors to occur no matter
how well intentioned you may be.
Speaker 6 (31:08):
There was such urgency to everything day to day life
feels life and death. They had this way of ramping
everything up and making it feel constantly anxious. Six o'clock
they'd say headcount, and you'd just be woken up with yelling,
and then you have three minutes to make your bed,
(31:30):
get into the hall, and for head count. Everything is
just mind numbing routine. So you'd get up and then
you would After they do headcount, you go back to
your room and you have a short amount of time
to bathe so four girls would share one bathroom, and
I remember the toilets were always backed up in the basement,
(31:50):
like constantly overflowing. It was awful and so and also
when you're in your room, you don't you're not allowed
to talk. You have chores, and so each room is
split up, like they had a bathroom and then they
had dusting and vacuuming and mirrors and then trash and like,
(32:12):
so they had different jobs. And so we would clean
our room every day and then we'd get that done,
we'd get ourselves dressed. Showers were maybe three minutes. We
were supposed to only have three minute showers, which I
have a lot of air. I never felt like I
was clean or adequately dried off, honestly, because you just
(32:34):
have to hurry so fast. The water was never warm.
So you get you bathe really quickly. And then they
have what's called inspection. So your room is clean everything,
so then they come in and inspect if there's so
they had really arbitrary rules. For instance, like we had
one laundry basket that had all of our earthly possessions
(32:55):
in it, and you had to cover your laundry basket
with a howl and then your hangers in the closet
have to be two finger spaces apart. And there's no
not allowed to be water in the sink or the tups,
so it had to be completely dry and shiny, and
like these weird things had no bearing on cleanliness at all,
(33:17):
and they would go and if you if there was
something not done, if they found a speck of dust,
some staff really got into an order or white gloves
and like wow, in this very corner of the closet,
I think I find a little tiny speck of dust,
and then you would get an essay.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
According to Kirby, essays were used as a form of
punishment and could be issued to the children at any
point in time for any reason. I've heard from many
survivors the essays were a tedious, grueling process. Not to mention,
the content of the essays could apparently be excruciatingly dry.
Speaker 6 (33:55):
It's mind numbing to write why you left, like a
wrinkle in your comforter. It's just it's so mine imme.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
And while day to day life at Cross Creek was
challenging for Kirby, there was one person in particular who
would make it unbearable. We unfortunately can't name this individual
as he has never been criminally charged with a crime.
Even so, we felt it was important to share this
part of her allegations.
Speaker 6 (34:25):
So we had our first group therapy that day, even
though it was a Saturday, and I thought it was
a group therapy, and this man came in. A person
that will live in my nightmares, probably for the rest
of my life. He is one of those people that
just show up in my dreams and I cannot make
him leave me. He was a very scary, intimidating person.
(34:50):
He was huge physically, and he would get in your face.
And he told me right away that he thought I
was full it, that there's no way that I was
being honest about who I was, that I was a liar,
that I was probably a criminal and a slut. And
(35:13):
you can't stand up for yourself. If you do stand
up for yourself, you'll get in trouble. But if you
don't stand up for yourself, you'll also be in trouble.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
According to Kirby, most students would desperately try to avoid
this staff member's attention, but she shares that she felt
she must have caught his attention for some reason, and
that he began to be rate her daily.
Speaker 6 (35:37):
He told me that that I would I was weak
empathetic and I had no will of my own. That
I just would do what anyone else asked me to,
and that was why I was here because I was
too stupid, too stupid to know better. I was just
really young and scared is. He like to have little
(36:00):
object lessons, and one of his lessons was one day
he said that I was a doormat and in a
high traffic area in the rec center where people have
to walk from going from place to place. He made
me lie on the floor all day with a sign
that said doormat, and when people walked by, they had
to step on me and look me in the eye. Well,
the first time, I was lying on my stomach half
(36:21):
the day, so I don't have to look at them.
They just had to step on me. But he's like, no,
you're not getting the full effect of this. So I
need you to look them in the eye when they
do it, And so I did.
Speaker 1 (36:32):
What Kirby says happened is a form of abuse that
leaves no physical scars, no proof for the parents waiting
on the outside, on the other side of the walls
away from her parent's eyes. Kirby was still willing to
risk it all and stand up for her friend, even
though she knew being noticed could lead to something horrible.
Speaker 6 (36:54):
There's a girl in the group that thought she might
be gay, and the facilitator just ripped her apart. One
of the things we had to do is like stand
on a chair where everyone just you stand in front
of yone and they just rip you to shreds rubally.
And he said that she was selfish, she didn't care
about her family, that she was just doing it for
(37:17):
attention and all of these things. And he's like, and
he made her go sit apart from the group in
the seminar, and he said, does anyone have a problem
with what I did? And my one weakness, and I
hope that it's strength, is that I really stick up
for people that don't have voices, Like that is something
I never had a voice, and so I will not
be quiet when other people are hurting or need help.
(37:39):
So I said I'll sit with her. Well, I got
kicked out, she got kicked out, and I had to
I was put in an isolation room to do my
seminar homework.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
What Kirby describes happening next is inexcusable.
Speaker 6 (37:55):
Well, unfortunately, they were doing some maintenance on the building
or something. I'm not entirely sure what happened. But this
isolation room, it's a carpeted room. Like I said, it
has a little camera in the corner, and then there's
a big heavy metal door with a tiny glass, filthy
glass window in it, and then right around the wall
(38:15):
on the other side there's a desk covered in little
TV sets and those are all the feeds for the
cameras and the isolation rooms that the staff would watch.
Also all the girls walking by, I would always see
what was on the TVs. Well, for some reason, the
facility was empty. They were doing maintenance except for the
seminar and that building, and they forgot me. So it
(38:36):
was a Friday afternoon. I did my homework and I
sat in the position facing the camera with my Indian
style actually I hate using that term, but with my
legs crossed in my hands out like this like so
they could see. And I sat there and sat there
and sat there, and no one came. And I thought
(38:58):
it was a test. I thought I thought they were
testing me to see like I couldn't hear anything. It
was quiet, and it smelled really bad, and I had
to pee and I couldn't get out. Well, it went
on and on and on, and I didn't have a
wait of mark time, and it got real bad in
that room. And well it was a Friday. They did
(39:19):
not find me till Monday, early Monday morning, and I
had been in that room, without a bathroom, without food,
without other people, all alone, and it was horrible. I
thought the world had ended because no one could hear me.
I was singing to myself. Anything was to always my mind.
(39:44):
And then that morning they found me. They forgot about me.
They thought I was still in the seminar. They didn't
know that I was out of it.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
According to Kirby, staff later apologized and she was asked
to never speak of the end again, even in group therapy.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
Tabitha Echavria is a clinical psychologist who, while at Widner
University in twenty nineteen, wrote her thesis, The Effects of
wasp's Institutionalization on the Lives of Troubled Teens, which digs
into the cause and effect of WASP programs. You will
hear from her throughout this season, and her statements are
based on her graduate research.
Speaker 10 (40:29):
I mean, I think the primary way that scare tactics
inhibit growth is because they usually exacerbate negative emotions.
Speaker 6 (40:37):
And so when folks who.
Speaker 10 (40:38):
Are already having really hard emotions like depression and anxiety
and suicidal thoughts, and they're put into a position where
the pressure is put on them that they feel worse
about themselves and worse about their capabilities and worse about
their self esteem, that doesn't tend to you know, it
(40:59):
doesn't heal them, and it exacerbates those hard feelings. We
also have really significant like emotional these kind of emotional
manipulation tactics that are going on. You know, one of
the biggest reflags was that they didn't understand why it
was being used, or the only explanation was because there
(41:20):
was maybe a rule that was broken that they didn't
have memorized. And so that concerns me because isolation like
where social people. We're social people are social beings, and
to be isolated from others is a punishment. And so
whenever I hear anything that's like pointing to a punishment, like,
(41:41):
I'm concerned because punishment has negative ramifications on your psychological health.
Speaker 6 (41:47):
And also it's just it's just not helpful, like why
are we doing that?
Speaker 10 (41:52):
Ultimately, you know they have staff here that are working
and they're not qualified, but it doesn't really matter because
one's going to know and there is no no, there's
no implications for being unqualified or doing a bad job.
And I think different types of people are attracted to
(42:14):
those settings, Like I don't know that the most qualified
individuals are drawn to work in settings where.
Speaker 6 (42:25):
This sort of thing is going on.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
The lack of qualified staff also seeped into the schooling aspect.
These families were promised that their child would receive a
good education while in these programs, yet Kirby describes how
the academic experience left much to be desired.
Speaker 6 (42:45):
School was the biggest joke. They didn't even have real textbooks.
They had photocopies. We had real textbooks that someone had
copied and stapled together. We did not have We had
ah teacher. The teacher didn't teach any way, shape or form.
They were there to grade our stuff.
Speaker 7 (43:06):
Now it was.
Speaker 6 (43:10):
I guess I started ninth grade there and it was
the most dumbed down school or I've ever had. It
was just outdated and just terrible, especially where it comes
to maths. And sciences, because science, it's very hard to
(43:31):
do biology or chemistry without actually doing experiments, so we
had to do them in theory. So you'd read the
book and say, well, this is what's supposed to have
excuse me, module read the horribly copied paper that you
can't even read, and try to figure out what experiment is,
and then write an essay about what's supposed to happen.
(43:51):
And then you have to lie, you really do, because
it completely removes a scientific process, because you're like, well,
it says it's going to do this, so I guess it.
They'll do this.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
By the time Kirby left in nineteen ninety eight, four
years after arriving, she had been there longer than any
other student. She told us that they even offered her
a job to work in another facility, a practice that
she says was common within WASP. She turned them down.
Prior to its closure, Cross Creek and its representatives maintained
(44:25):
that it did provide sufficient academic tutoring and resources to
the girls, alleging that it was supervised by the Northwest
Association of Schools and Colleges and Universities. In fact, in
a two thousand and three lawsuit filed by Cross Creek
against a parent whose child attended another WASP affiliated facility.
Cross Creek maintained it employed twenty one teachers and had
(44:48):
a full time staff of therapists, social workers, and a psychologist.
That lawsuit was settled and dismissed in two thousand and four.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
That wouldn't be the only lawsuit cross Creek would face
over years. In nineteen ninety five, a local Utah newspaper
reported an incident involving an employee at the facility who
entered a plea deal in a case of alleged forced
sexual abuse against a fifteen year old girl. The girl
testified that the employee touched her inappropriately while on the
(45:18):
night shift, but Cross Creek's internal investigation could not substantiate
her claims. Reporting in nineteen ninety eight and nineteen ninety
nine covered another lawsuit filed against Cross Creek in connection
with allegations of abuse and maltreatment suffered by a young
girl who attended the program at the time. Robert Litchfield
(45:39):
told one of the newspapers that the case had already
been reviewed by Utah officials and that they cleared Cross
Creek employees of any wrongdoing. Teen Help, which was a
related marketing company we discussed earlier in this episode, further
denied the allegations, telling the paper that it had absolutely
no credibility. Publicly available documents were related to the case
(46:01):
revealed that the lawsuit was dismissed by the trial court.
The plaintiffs, the one suing Cross Creek, repeatedly failed to
comply with orders to hand over evidence for the legal
process of discovery. The plaintiffs appealed, but the appellate court
agreed with the trial court's dismissal, and no judgment of
wrongdoing against Cross Creek was ever made. You see, justice
(46:23):
is complex and multifaceted. We've seen that some steps have
been taken towards holding Cross Creek officials accountable, but it
still leaves the full extent of justice for survivors in limbo.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
That's why we feel it's important to use our platform
here in Trapped in Treatment to make silenced voices heard.
Here's Kirby again.
Speaker 6 (46:46):
One of the things I've learned about human nature is
when we see someone suffering, it's painful for us, so
we want to avoid it, and after a while, people's
eyes just slide past you like you're not even there,
and then you have this problem exist. Am I real
is this happening? Because you're stuck in your own head
and if people around you are reflection of your existence,
(47:09):
then you're no one. And so that was something that
I really had a hard time with. I didn't know
who'd ask for help. There was no one coming to
help me, and I disappeared.
Speaker 2 (47:33):
With the help of Narvin and the Internet, the demand
for Litchfield services was growing at a rapid pace. Inquiries
at Cross Creek were abundant and the number of students
continued to rise. Cross Creek was doing well financially and
inquiries were coming in daily. All of the puzzle pieces
were coming together for Robert, but to grow beyond Majestic
(47:54):
Ranch and Cross Creek, Lichfield would need a reliable way
to get kids into the programs. He continue to open
a processing center of sorts, so he acquired the rights
to manage and operate Brightway Adolescent Hospital, a short term
psychiatric hospital in Saint George, Utah. There, kids would be
evaluated before likely being referred to longer term treatment. Parents
(48:20):
felt like their children were being professionally and independently assessed,
but the thing about evaluations at Brightway was they almost
always led to one of wasp's programs next week on
trapped in treatment.
Speaker 11 (48:37):
It was near freezing when we got out of the
car in Utah, and I was just that just added
to the sense of confusion and shock I was feeling.
When we got up to the door, it had one
of those big, like magnetically locked doors like you sometimes
see like in prison movies and stuff like that, that
(48:58):
had that buzz us in and hear the hair and
then the door kind of swings open, and once it closed,
it was really clear that I was not going to
get out.
Speaker 4 (49:09):
Of that place.
Speaker 2 (49:16):
From records available to us, it appears Cross Creek suddenly
shut down sometime between twenty eleven and twenty thirteen. Public
business records show that the corporate entities associated with the
facility expired between twenty thirteen and twenty fourteen. Further, all
of our efforts to reach Robert Litchfield and Dan Peert
for comment were unsuccessful, and they did not respond to
(49:38):
our request for comment. From our research, neither of them
have ever been charged with or found guilty of any
crimes stemming from allegations of abuse or in connection with
WASP or any of the schools affiliated THEREWITH.
Speaker 12 (49:54):
Hey everyone, it's Paris. Thanks for listening to episode three.
Cross Creek was just the beginning. We want to hear
your thoughts. Use the hashtag trapped in Treatment and tell
us what the most shocking part has been so far,
and make sure to listen to new episodes every week
on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
The following episode contains disturbing and graphic accounts of survivor experiences.
It may not be suitable for younger audiences. Please listen
with care.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
From iHeartRadio London Audio and executive producer Paris Hilton. This
is Trapped in Treatment. We're your hosts. I'm Rebecca Mellinger Brown.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
And I'm Caroline Cole. Join us on our journey to
uncover the hidden truths of an industry shrouded in scandal.
We're on a mission to make sure that no child
has to experience the hell that is the troubled teen industry.
But we're also on a quest to uncover why justice
has not been served for so many of these survivors.
(00:52):
This season is all about WASP, the Worldwide Association of
Specialty Programs and Schools of the the largest networks of
troubled teen programs in the industry, masterminded by one man,
Robert Litchfield. The stories you will hear in the following
episode are the personal allegations and accounts of individuals who
(01:15):
have attended treatment at one of these programs. All experiences, views,
and opinions are their own. To protect their identities, some
names have been changed.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Last week on Trapped in Treatment, we heard the story
of Tony, a young boy abused by his stepmother and
sent to Majestic Ranch, the facility opened by Robert Litchfield's
brother in law, Dan Peered. We also heard from Brittany,
a dorm parent there. According to former staff and students
who attended Majestic Ranch, the children were forced into hard
(01:50):
labor with little understanding of how this was supposed to
help them. Litchfield was the inspiration behind Majestic after convincing
his brother in law that this was a lucrative opportunity.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
And depending on whatever they were doing that day for ADAPT,
you know, then that's where the kid would be sent.
And sometimes it was to the maneuver pile to shovel manure,
and just stand in the poop pile and just shovel
poop till that staff member running ADAPT felt that they
were done, and a lot of the kids didn't. They
(02:25):
didn't want to shovel poop. Nobody wants to stand and
shovel poop.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
After leaving Provocanian School, Lichfield attended a seminar called Keys
to Success, which laid the groundwork for so much of
wasp's ideology. He and two of the facilitators he met
at the seminar, including Dwayne Smotherman, started working together and
from there Lichfield had a unique model that he could
sell to vulnerable parents. He was off to the races
(02:54):
and opened his first program, Cross Creek Manor for Girls
in Laverk in Utah. Before we dive into the survivor
stories about Cross Creek, we feel it's important to explain
how the program was set up based on stories we've heard.
For many new students, learning the ropes of the program
feels like being on another planet, unlike anything they've experienced before.
(03:18):
We got Dwayne Smotherman, the seminar facilitator we heard from
an episode two, to explain to us the program Lichfield created.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
When those schools we were created, they wanted to have
a way to measure progress, and so they developed a
level system, a one through six level system. So the
kids immediately had certain kinds of goals and metrics that
(03:47):
they had to achieve in order to make progress or
they would just be stagnant. And that's how we measured it,
you know, and that's how we measure it in a
big part of that was, for example, the privilege of
family visits where would you know, just get together the
mom and dad and whomever in the family. In the
great part of that is that the kids were incentivized
(04:08):
from the very beginning to do better, to let go
of a lot of the behaviors and the attitude that
they had had that got them into the program in
the first place.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Moving up in levels was important because that was the
only way to earn your way home. Survivors have stated
that gaining levels was difficult. Participants had to go through
an approval process consisting of your peers, staff and upper administration.
Chelsea Filer, the survivor and activist we heard from an
episode one, elaborates more on the program structure.
Speaker 5 (04:41):
We had a level system, and this would be where
the upper levels would essentially be policing the lower levels,
and that was you know, kids that had been there
longer and moved up in the levels based on a
point system. And that point system, very much like a game,
(05:03):
was that you needed to try to get points so
that you could earn your rights back and basic privileges.
Privileges like being able to speak to other people, being
able to call your parents, even eat condiments at dinner
and a candy bar once in a while.
Speaker 6 (05:23):
And you know, these.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Upper levels, the junior staff, essentially were tasked with taking
your points away. They would watch you like a hawk
and give you consequences for any rule violation. Now, those
rules were really strict. Some of them were just totally asinine.
(05:48):
Other ones were just abuses, abusive in and of themselves.
We weren't allowed to speak to each other, we weren't
allowed to speak without permission. We couldn't look out the window,
we couldn't even nonverbally communicate to each other. And you know,
(06:08):
a lot of things were just way too strict, to
the point that there would it would be really difficult
to be able to follow those rules themselves.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Those so called privileges are things that so many of
us take for granted on a day to day basis,
things as simple as calling your parents, looking out the window,
or using the restroom in private. But here at Cross
Creek and so many other WASP facilities, those everyday details
that can seem so trivial were actually something to strive for.
(06:46):
To us, at least, it feels like any semblance of
individuality or autonomy was stripped away the moment these children
walked through the door. Instead, identities seemingly revolved around a
point system. Advancing in the program was difficult, especially when
both peers and staff were watching your every move. Gaining
(07:08):
levels was not a linear path. Sometimes students would lose
levels or have to start their program over from the
very beginning, no matter how long they had been there.
But more than that, the program wanted to see that
the kids were willing to leave everything from their past behind,
including their own identity. They called this getting out of
(07:29):
your image. Here's Dwayne.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
I mean, you know, the image issues dealt with anything
from you know, the music you listened to, the clothes
you wore, the friends you hung out with. You know,
you had kids where you know we're coming from, you know,
really affluent areas, a lot of them between from affluent areas,
attempting to look like they were these ghetto, inner city
(07:53):
kids with all the talk on the walk and so
forth and so on, and so, I mean, you know,
the only to let go of that and to deal
with that was a big, big part of the progress
of the program.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Dwayne told us that the purpose was to get the
kids out of their current image, to revert them back
to who they were before they headed down the wrong
path to do that. First, they had to label their image.
Were they a prep, a goth, a thug? Then they
were forced to shed this image permanently, as Dwayne puts it.
(08:26):
If they didn't, they weren't working the program, and they
weren't ready to go home.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
And for some of the teens it took longer than others.
Others it was a shock for them to be out
of their home, out of their environment with their friends
and so forth, and they had of all their comings
and goings, and it was a shock them. So they
really got on the horse and worked really hard.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
How did it get to a point where parents were
choosing to subject their kids to treatment like this? Based
on our research for this podcast, the answer seems to
lie in WASPS. Sophisticated and strategic marketing. WASP captured the
attention and trust of parents, convincing them to send their
kids to these programs. Parents like Lindsay's.
Speaker 7 (09:11):
I grew up in northern California. I had a pretty
good childhood. I was an only child, you know, I
was My parents were very involved in my upbringing and
recreational type things, you know, sports and ballet and things
like that. They were very good parents. I would say,
I'd had a very uneventful childhood mostly. And then as
(09:34):
I went into middle school, I had a friend that
I started hanging out with that was kind of from
a different situation, and you know, her parents got her
into drugs and things like that very early on, things
that I had never been exposed to because my parents
wanted me to be like a poster child. So I
(09:56):
think that was what started setting off alarms for them.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Lindsay's new friend, it may not have been an ideal choice,
but she never actually did drugs or anything really except
having the wrong friend group in her parents' eyes.
Speaker 7 (10:09):
When I was in I think I was a sophomore
in high school when they decided to send me to
a boss program, and I had been hanging out with
like some gothy kids that were kind of into that scene.
And it was actually, like I said, I was sent
there in May of ninety nine. It was the Columbine
shooting that happened that my parents thought that somehow, I
(10:34):
don't know if you remember all that media hype back then,
but there was a lot of stuff about a trench
coat mafia, and like people thought that it was like
a like a I don't know, a worldwide thing or something,
but it was really just pertained to that one school,
and my parents were like, she's hanging out with people
who dress like that, so they must be up to
(10:54):
the same kind of stuff. And I think that was
what kind of made them, you.
Speaker 6 (10:59):
Know, pulled.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Lindsey would be sent to Cross Creek Manor First.
Speaker 7 (11:05):
I was actually one of the few that my parents
are actually straight up with me about it, telling me
that this was kind of a disciplinary you know action
they were commit like doing here by sending me that
to this program, but they definitely didn't know what it
was really like. I mean, they made it sound very
(11:27):
different than what it was in actuality.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Lindsay told us that her parents had discovered the program
in a local magazine.
Speaker 7 (11:36):
I believe it was in the back of a Sunset magazine.
There's all kinds of ads for homewares, and then all
of a sudden, there's this is your child out of control,
you know, sort of in one of those marketing ads.
West tended to have a lot of ads that made
the place look like, you know, it's a summer camp.
(12:00):
You're going to raise bunnies and learn agriculture, and you know,
so my parents kind of looked at that and they thought, well,
this would be a nice little retreat for her. You know.
They really had no idea what was really going on,
which is the story with most parents.
Speaker 6 (12:14):
I think.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
The infamous Sunset magazine ad Duyne Smotherman remembers these ads vividly.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
If you looked in the back of Sunset magazine back
in the day, there was these advertisements for all these
schools in the back of the magazine, which was really
kind of funny because Sunset was like a home decor
environmental kind of magazine with all these great pictures and
landscapes and so forth, and then you look in the
back and there's all these advertisements for these the all
these schools, and they arranged from a military style schools
(12:50):
that were based on a control element, to schools that
were just simply almost like a day camp, kind of
almost like a spa for teens, if you will.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Whether Dwayne realized it or not, many of these advertisements
were strategic for Dan Peart's ranch. They initially started with
traditional ads. Here's another clip from the twenty eleven University
of Utah Archives Oral History interview of Dan Peart, which
gives us some insight into the evolution of Lichfield's marketing plan.
Speaker 8 (13:25):
Well, we used to advertise in Sunset magazine and that's
how we first started. And then we'd get out and
beat the bushes and work with therapists and guidance counselors
and then they'd prefer and then the Internet come along,
and that's when it exploded.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
And that's the moment that Narvin, Robert's brother, really got involved.
In nineteen ninety one, Robert Litchfield had started a marketing
company called teen Help, a company that would become the
cornerstone of his marketing strategy for the WASP network of
proke rams.
Speaker 9 (14:01):
Yeah, my older brother had added teen ol and I
basically was you know, I was the person who hired
the staff and trained the staff.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
And Narvin was recently out of college with a degree
in sociology and working with his brother came at the
opportune moment thanks to the power of the newly burgeoning
Internet when I graduated.
Speaker 6 (14:23):
Literally he asked me to come right down.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
Take over his marketing because he just didn't the market and.
Speaker 9 (14:33):
So we I came down and we took over and
they were probably doing two kids for a month two
three kids per month as far as admissions, and the
first month of my admissions I did sixteen kids and
then we averaged about twenty five kids.
Speaker 8 (14:52):
And I have a unique.
Speaker 9 (14:55):
Ability to, for whatever reason, to.
Speaker 6 (15:00):
To be good on the phone.
Speaker 9 (15:01):
And our psychiatrist W. D. Belnapp, who was an amazing being,
helped us establish a lot of things that we did.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
W D.
Speaker 9 (15:12):
Bell said, he said, Narvin, you're the best ever heard
on the phone. You're You're very good getting the confidence
of their parents because you're a knowledge ex And then
you know, I guess I'm a salesman in some form.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
So in the length of my.
Speaker 9 (15:30):
Running the marketing with two different marketing companies that we
established what we became the biggest in the world.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
This was the early days of the Internet. Most people
didn't have emails, let alone in online marketing strategy, especially
not one aimed at funneling kids out of their community
and into facilities in far off lands.
Speaker 9 (15:53):
Yes, I am al Gore. I did invent the Internet.
I'm just telling you up front. We were the first
real thing on the Internet actually making money. I had
a friend from high school who felt impressed. Again, you know,
I have a spiritual aspect of my life. Who felt
impressed to come and visit me in Saint George, Utah.
(16:14):
He had put up this mall on the internet in
nineteen ninety two or nineteen ninety three, and he came
to me and just said, I felt impressed. We hadn't
seen each other, and we serve lds missions and gone
to college and I both got married, and we hadn't
seen or done anything since high school. And he said,
(16:34):
I just felt impressed.
Speaker 6 (16:35):
I was supposed to come visit you. And he explained
what he was.
Speaker 4 (16:41):
Doing with the Internet.
Speaker 6 (16:42):
I had never even heard of the internet.
Speaker 9 (16:44):
Until he came explaining to it to me, because it
was just in the first stages of the Internet taking on,
and I saw it immediately for what it could do.
And so I hired him, secured all the websites for
our different entities, and then hired a guy that was
(17:04):
because you know, at that time, webs web call or
Alta Vista were the top you know, searchages, and they
were non dynamic. They were so simple to manipulate. It
was scary. I'm written up in so long magazine.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
If you won't get bored, look it up.
Speaker 6 (17:21):
They were mad at me.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
We looked it up, and what we found was eye opening.
Back in nineteen ninety eight, journalists were already drawing attention
to Robert's booming business. Of particular note were his methods
of Internet advertising. One critical article focused on trojan horse keywords,
hundreds of slightly different keywords that were invisible to the
(17:45):
normal web surfer at the time.
Speaker 6 (17:47):
So it's likely that.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Any parent who used certain terms in their searches like
help for my team, may have inadvertently found themselves directed
towards a WASP program website. This is called spamdexing, a
method of stuffing as many keywords as possible onto a
web page, a marketing tactic that became very popular until
(18:08):
major search engines began penalizing sites that did this. By
today's standards, Narvin's method would be considered a violation of
advertising ethics, as it would cause teen health and future
loss programs to be one of the dominant options that
would show up during a keyword search, but he felt
it was all fair game.
Speaker 9 (18:30):
When they would do a search for troubled kids or
services for troubled kids. My company was the first two
hundred entries, and they said this is not fair. I said,
Oh really, I think this is what this business is
is whoever can advertise the best is going to get
the most clients, you know, as far as we go.
(18:52):
And that's the whole point is to control of the
search engines. I mean, it's pretty obvious, isn't it now.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Once again an interesting word choice by Narvin, because that's
so much of what WASP programs are based on, a
form of control over powerless teens and children. The Internet
represented a new horizon and unprecedented expansion. But the deep
irony is that even though the Internet and its new
global footprint opened major doors for Lichfield's organization, it seems
(19:25):
as if some of these programs could not be further
from the modern world.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
For some people, a change of scenery would hardly mean
an escape from difficulties at home. Kirby, whose name we've
changed for legal reasons and to protect her privacy, was
just fourteen years old when she was sent away to
Cross Creek Manor. She shared with us that she had
a difficult childhood and had experienced a lot of trauma
(19:58):
by the time she arrived. The following is Kirby's recollection
of her childhood and her initial experiences at Cross Creek.
Speaker 6 (20:09):
So it's kind of funny because I kind of always
say the first five years of my life kind of
defined me later. I was born into a really bad
home with a mom that was severely addicted to drugs,
and she was engaged in prostitution and all that kind
of stuff, and that's how she got pregnant with me.
(20:31):
There were a lot of men coming in and out
of the home the first three years of my life.
I was sexually abused, like I'm not really sure how
many times. It's severe.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Kirby shared that when she was just three years old,
her mother and three of her mother's friends were arrested
and charged with the rape of a minor. Kirby says
she was sent away taken into the foster care system,
where she would spend the next three years of her life.
When a young couple with no children of their own
decided to adopt her, she hoped she might finally have
(21:07):
the kind of family she saw on TV.
Speaker 6 (21:10):
But then, but then my adoptive parents, who were my
next life, got really bored with being parents really quickly.
They wanted this little redhead doll to play with. I
think my mom, I think that she thought that I
was like this exciting toy, and she got bored really
(21:30):
quickly when I was a real person.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Her new guardians didn't live up to the fantasy that
she had held in her heart for so long.
Speaker 6 (21:39):
My parents were exceptionally strict and abusive. They locked me
in a room with a dead bowl all the time
I went to school and home and church, and I
didn't have friends. I didn't have toys, I didn't have belongings.
It was like prison.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
It didn't seem to matter how well behaved Kirby was
or how bright. She felt. Her new parents weren't in
in parenting, but they wouldn't let her go. According to Kirby,
they had other reasons for keeping her in their care.
Speaker 6 (22:09):
That my parents were paid a monthly stipend for my
care until I was eighteen, and in addition to my
medical and psychiatric care, so they a really nice way
to get me out of the way was to send
me away, and so they did that.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
After two stints and treatment centers. Kirby felt her adopted
parents had no intention of keeping her around. They traveled
as much as possible and would leave Kirby behind. She
says she treasured these trips because she could get to
stay with a couple that she had known since she
was little.
Speaker 6 (22:45):
My so, my parents would go on vacations and it
was one of the best times of my life because
they didn't want to bring me. My brother would go,
but they didn't want to bring me, so they would
send me to stay with friends. And I had this
foster family and this other couple that I lived with
that had known me since I was little, and I
would spend the summers there sometimes and it was heaven like.
(23:07):
It was my only time I got to be a
real kid.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
It was during one of these vacations that Kirby received
a hint that her next stretch and treatment might be
right around the corner.
Speaker 6 (23:20):
This really nice elderly lady. When I was at her house,
she told me that when I was going to fly
home to Boise because I was in Utah busying her,
she said that there might be people there to take
me somewhere and to not go.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Kirby returned to Boise on heightened alert, but she wasn't
taken away by transporters, as the elderly lady had warned. Instead,
her parents gave her a choice.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
They gave me two Broushures was for Provo Canyon. It
was called Provocanding Girls School at the time, and then
one for Crosskreek Manor and they said you pick well.
Crosstreet Manor looked amazing. There were horses and like a
giant Olympic swimming pool and like all these lovely girls
with books and I love books. That is, if you
(24:07):
wanted to catch me like a kid, people offer kid candy,
offer me books, and I will come running. It's a
trap for me. So I was just like, well, this
looks great. And they talked about academics, and I love
to learn and I'm a big nerd that way. So
I was like, yeah, this sounds great. I'll get away
from my parents. That did not work out the way anticipated.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Her parents drove her across the state borders to Laverkin
in Utah, and then left her there. If you were
to drive through the town of Laverkin, Utah, you may
miss it all together. It's a tiny city near the
Nevada Utah border that has a current population of around
four thousand. It's a dry and dusty place with one
(24:52):
main street, one supermarket, and mostly emptier rundown restaurants.
Speaker 6 (24:58):
It's it's like a one stop sign kind of town.
There's no nothing out there. It's red dirt and sage
brush and nothing. The people there, a lot of people
that live there, aren't even like high school graduates, like
there's there's not a lot of opportunities there for education
(25:19):
or jobs or upwards motility at all. It's all just
kind of like you're born here, you die here, and
they a lot of people never leave, and unfortunately that
kind of limits their worldview because that's the only experience
they have is kind of in this closed context.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
According to Kirby, most of the people there have lived
in laverc in their entire lives. Most never leave, but
sometimes new people would arrive. They were dropped off by
anxious parents or even delivered in handcuffs by transporters. They
were young, ranging in age from thirteen to seventeen, and
(25:55):
had no idea what was in store for them. Today,
many of these kids identify as survivors, but then they
were just scared and had no idea what they were
in for. Kirby spent four years of her life in
this desert town. The Cross Creek Manor Campus was at
(26:16):
the edge of town, at the base of a local
hill range. At the time, it was a series of
low lying white buildings with white gates guarding the entrance.
After Kirby arrived with her parents, she says, it seemed
like it might be like the brochures promised.
Speaker 6 (26:33):
I got there into this building and it looked really nice.
It had like pillars. It was like an old Greek
style column building, and it looked nice, like, well, this
wouldn't be too bad. There was a fountain, and I
remember all this tile and like fake plants.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
So far, so good, right, But then Kirby shares that
she noticed something odd.
Speaker 6 (26:59):
There was no one around. There were no kids or
other things, and I was like, that's weird.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Kirby's observation was telling. She quickly came to believe that
not all was as it seemed.
Speaker 6 (27:12):
What I didn't know at the time was that was
the parent friendly location that they would show the parents,
because it was a lot better looking compared to where
we actually spent our time. And so I was crying
and I'm like, I don't want to go to another
mental hospital. That's what I had called it, and they're like,
it's not a mental hospital. And then my parents left.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
According to Kirby. After her parents left, things quickly took
a turn for the worse. For legal reasons, we have
to note that these are her allegations, and no one
affiliated with WASP or Cross Creek have confirmed the following
allegations or ever been charged with or found guilty of
a crime stemming therefrom.
Speaker 10 (27:57):
Well.
Speaker 6 (27:57):
Immediately they put me in a van me to this
other building and that's called the rec Center, that's what
they called it. And it's this literal box, doesn't have windows,
it's just a box. And then behind it there's a
yard and it has chain link fences and barbed wire
across the top, and there's a kind of a little grasp,
(28:19):
but not really and there's just red dirt and that's
where the girls would walk. We called the yard. So
we got there and they put me immediately in an
isolation room they called them ISO. And it was awful.
It was carpeted Florida ceiling, and it smelled horribly like
(28:39):
urine and sweat and just you know, unwashed bodies that
really bad smell. And it was really overwhelming. And this
woman came in and she made me take all my
clothes off, and she felt between my legs and in
my backside and under my breasts, and she made me
(29:03):
lie down and put my legs up. And then a
man came in and did a pelsic exam. He did
not wear gloves. He had a very low cut shirt
and this necklace chain and I just remember that necklace
was like swinging in my face. It was very scary.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Kirby recounts that she was disoriented and scared, but tried
her best to adjust to her new surroundings.
Speaker 6 (29:30):
They didn't tell me the rules, they didn't tell me
what was expected of me. It was scary. And they
told me that it would be a six month, two
year program and that I just needed to work my
program and I could go home. And I was like, well,
I've done this before, I can do this and this
will be fine. And I knew there was no point
(29:52):
in crying. My parents didn't care, so I sucked it up.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Kirby was constantly on edge and seemingly made to believe
that everything in her life was of her own doing.
To me, at least, it sounds like a complex duality
of being wholly responsible for oneself and yet completely powerless
at the same time.
Speaker 6 (30:16):
Their premise is that you're accountable for every single thing
in your life, whether you trip over your own feet
or you anything that you do is your fault. And
they have these little cute sayings like that which is
not acted upon, as not learned or based on your results,
(30:40):
you have exactly what you intended. And they one of
the premises that they push is there are no accidents.
So every single thing that happens in your life, whether
by you or from another person, is directly your responsibility
and you have to take accountability for that.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
And as many of us can relate to, feeling anxious
and rushed leaves room for errors to occur no matter
how well intentioned you may be.
Speaker 6 (31:08):
There was such urgency to everything day to day life
feels life and death. They had this way of ramping
everything up and making it feel constantly anxious. Six o'clock
they'd say headcount, and you'd just be woken up with yelling,
and then you have three minutes to make your bed,
(31:30):
get into the hall, and for head count. Everything is
just mind numbing routine. So you'd get up and then
you would After they do headcount, you go back to
your room and you have a short amount of time
to bathe so four girls would share one bathroom, and
I remember the toilets were always backed up in the basement,
(31:50):
like constantly overflowing. It was awful and so and also
when you're in your room, you don't you're not allowed
to talk. You have chores, and so each room is
split up, like they had a bathroom and then they
had dusting and vacuuming and mirrors and then trash and like,
(32:12):
so they had different jobs. And so we would clean
our room every day and then we'd get that done,
we'd get ourselves dressed. Showers were maybe three minutes. We
were supposed to only have three minute showers, which I
have a lot of air. I never felt like I
was clean or adequately dried off, honestly, because you just
(32:34):
have to hurry so fast. The water was never warm.
So you get you bathe really quickly. And then they
have what's called inspection. So your room is clean everything,
so then they come in and inspect if there's so
they had really arbitrary rules. For instance, like we had
one laundry basket that had all of our earthly possessions
(32:55):
in it, and you had to cover your laundry basket
with a howl and then your hangers in the closet
have to be two finger spaces apart. And there's no
not allowed to be water in the sink or the tups,
so it had to be completely dry and shiny, and
like these weird things had no bearing on cleanliness at all,
(33:17):
and they would go and if you if there was
something not done, if they found a speck of dust,
some staff really got into an order or white gloves
and like wow, in this very corner of the closet,
I think I find a little tiny speck of dust,
and then you would get an essay.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
According to Kirby, essays were used as a form of
punishment and could be issued to the children at any
point in time for any reason. I've heard from many
survivors the essays were a tedious, grueling process. Not to mention,
the content of the essays could apparently be excruciatingly dry.
Speaker 6 (33:55):
It's mind numbing to write why you left, like a
wrinkle in your comforter. It's just it's so mine imme.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
And while day to day life at Cross Creek was
challenging for Kirby, there was one person in particular who
would make it unbearable. We unfortunately can't name this individual
as he has never been criminally charged with a crime.
Even so, we felt it was important to share this
part of her allegations.
Speaker 6 (34:25):
So we had our first group therapy that day, even
though it was a Saturday, and I thought it was
a group therapy, and this man came in. A person
that will live in my nightmares, probably for the rest
of my life. He is one of those people that
just show up in my dreams and I cannot make
him leave me. He was a very scary, intimidating person.
(34:50):
He was huge physically, and he would get in your face.
And he told me right away that he thought I
was full it, that there's no way that I was
being honest about who I was, that I was a liar,
that I was probably a criminal and a slut. And
(35:13):
you can't stand up for yourself. If you do stand
up for yourself, you'll get in trouble. But if you
don't stand up for yourself, you'll also be in trouble.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
According to Kirby, most students would desperately try to avoid
this staff member's attention, but she shares that she felt
she must have caught his attention for some reason, and
that he began to be rate her daily.
Speaker 6 (35:37):
He told me that that I would I was weak
empathetic and I had no will of my own. That
I just would do what anyone else asked me to,
and that was why I was here because I was
too stupid, too stupid to know better. I was just
really young and scared is. He like to have little
(36:00):
object lessons, and one of his lessons was one day
he said that I was a doormat and in a
high traffic area in the rec center where people have
to walk from going from place to place. He made
me lie on the floor all day with a sign
that said doormat, and when people walked by, they had
to step on me and look me in the eye. Well,
the first time, I was lying on my stomach half
(36:21):
the day, so I don't have to look at them.
They just had to step on me. But he's like, no,
you're not getting the full effect of this. So I
need you to look them in the eye when they
do it, And so I did.
Speaker 1 (36:32):
What Kirby says happened is a form of abuse that
leaves no physical scars, no proof for the parents waiting
on the outside, on the other side of the walls
away from her parent's eyes. Kirby was still willing to
risk it all and stand up for her friend, even
though she knew being noticed could lead to something horrible.
Speaker 6 (36:54):
There's a girl in the group that thought she might
be gay, and the facilitator just ripped her apart. One
of the things we had to do is like stand
on a chair where everyone just you stand in front
of yone and they just rip you to shreds rubally.
And he said that she was selfish, she didn't care
about her family, that she was just doing it for
(37:17):
attention and all of these things. And he's like, and
he made her go sit apart from the group in
the seminar, and he said, does anyone have a problem
with what I did? And my one weakness, and I
hope that it's strength, is that I really stick up
for people that don't have voices, Like that is something
I never had a voice, and so I will not
be quiet when other people are hurting or need help.
(37:39):
So I said I'll sit with her. Well, I got
kicked out, she got kicked out, and I had to
I was put in an isolation room to do my
seminar homework.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
What Kirby describes happening next is inexcusable.
Speaker 6 (37:55):
Well, unfortunately, they were doing some maintenance on the building
or something. I'm not entirely sure what happened. But this
isolation room, it's a carpeted room. Like I said, it
has a little camera in the corner, and then there's
a big heavy metal door with a tiny glass, filthy
glass window in it, and then right around the wall
(38:15):
on the other side there's a desk covered in little
TV sets and those are all the feeds for the
cameras and the isolation rooms that the staff would watch.
Also all the girls walking by, I would always see
what was on the TVs. Well, for some reason, the
facility was empty. They were doing maintenance except for the
seminar and that building, and they forgot me. So it
(38:36):
was a Friday afternoon. I did my homework and I
sat in the position facing the camera with my Indian
style actually I hate using that term, but with my
legs crossed in my hands out like this like so
they could see. And I sat there and sat there
and sat there, and no one came. And I thought
(38:58):
it was a test. I thought I thought they were
testing me to see like I couldn't hear anything. It
was quiet, and it smelled really bad, and I had
to pee and I couldn't get out. Well, it went
on and on and on, and I didn't have a
wait of mark time, and it got real bad in
that room. And well it was a Friday. They did
(39:19):
not find me till Monday, early Monday morning, and I
had been in that room, without a bathroom, without food,
without other people, all alone, and it was horrible. I
thought the world had ended because no one could hear me.
I was singing to myself. Anything was to always my mind.
(39:44):
And then that morning they found me. They forgot about me.
They thought I was still in the seminar. They didn't
know that I was out of it.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
According to Kirby, staff later apologized and she was asked
to never speak of the end again, even in group therapy.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
Tabitha Echavria is a clinical psychologist who, while at Widner
University in twenty nineteen, wrote her thesis, The Effects of
wasp's Institutionalization on the Lives of Troubled Teens, which digs
into the cause and effect of WASP programs. You will
hear from her throughout this season, and her statements are
based on her graduate research.
Speaker 10 (40:29):
I mean, I think the primary way that scare tactics
inhibit growth is because they usually exacerbate negative emotions.
Speaker 6 (40:37):
And so when folks who.
Speaker 10 (40:38):
Are already having really hard emotions like depression and anxiety
and suicidal thoughts, and they're put into a position where
the pressure is put on them that they feel worse
about themselves and worse about their capabilities and worse about
their self esteem, that doesn't tend to you know, it
(40:59):
doesn't heal them, and it exacerbates those hard feelings. We
also have really significant like emotional these kind of emotional
manipulation tactics that are going on. You know, one of
the biggest reflags was that they didn't understand why it
was being used, or the only explanation was because there
(41:20):
was maybe a rule that was broken that they didn't
have memorized. And so that concerns me because isolation like
where social people. We're social people are social beings, and
to be isolated from others is a punishment. And so
whenever I hear anything that's like pointing to a punishment, like,
(41:41):
I'm concerned because punishment has negative ramifications on your psychological health.
Speaker 6 (41:47):
And also it's just it's just not helpful, like why
are we doing that?
Speaker 10 (41:52):
Ultimately, you know they have staff here that are working
and they're not qualified, but it doesn't really matter because
one's going to know and there is no no, there's
no implications for being unqualified or doing a bad job.
And I think different types of people are attracted to
(42:14):
those settings, Like I don't know that the most qualified
individuals are drawn to work in settings where.
Speaker 6 (42:25):
This sort of thing is going on.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
The lack of qualified staff also seeped into the schooling aspect.
These families were promised that their child would receive a
good education while in these programs, yet Kirby describes how
the academic experience left much to be desired.
Speaker 6 (42:45):
School was the biggest joke. They didn't even have real textbooks.
They had photocopies. We had real textbooks that someone had
copied and stapled together. We did not have We had
ah teacher. The teacher didn't teach any way, shape or form.
They were there to grade our stuff.
Speaker 7 (43:06):
Now it was.
Speaker 6 (43:10):
I guess I started ninth grade there and it was
the most dumbed down school or I've ever had. It
was just outdated and just terrible, especially where it comes
to maths. And sciences, because science, it's very hard to
(43:31):
do biology or chemistry without actually doing experiments, so we
had to do them in theory. So you'd read the
book and say, well, this is what's supposed to have
excuse me, module read the horribly copied paper that you
can't even read, and try to figure out what experiment is,
and then write an essay about what's supposed to happen.
(43:51):
And then you have to lie, you really do, because
it completely removes a scientific process, because you're like, well,
it says it's going to do this, so I guess it.
They'll do this.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
By the time Kirby left in nineteen ninety eight, four
years after arriving, she had been there longer than any
other student. She told us that they even offered her
a job to work in another facility, a practice that
she says was common within WASP. She turned them down.
Prior to its closure, Cross Creek and its representatives maintained
(44:25):
that it did provide sufficient academic tutoring and resources to
the girls, alleging that it was supervised by the Northwest
Association of Schools and Colleges and Universities. In fact, in
a two thousand and three lawsuit filed by Cross Creek
against a parent whose child attended another WASP affiliated facility.
Cross Creek maintained it employed twenty one teachers and had
(44:48):
a full time staff of therapists, social workers, and a psychologist.
That lawsuit was settled and dismissed in two thousand and four.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
That wouldn't be the only lawsuit cross Creek would face
over years. In nineteen ninety five, a local Utah newspaper
reported an incident involving an employee at the facility who
entered a plea deal in a case of alleged forced
sexual abuse against a fifteen year old girl. The girl
testified that the employee touched her inappropriately while on the
(45:18):
night shift, but Cross Creek's internal investigation could not substantiate
her claims. Reporting in nineteen ninety eight and nineteen ninety
nine covered another lawsuit filed against Cross Creek in connection
with allegations of abuse and maltreatment suffered by a young
girl who attended the program at the time. Robert Litchfield
(45:39):
told one of the newspapers that the case had already
been reviewed by Utah officials and that they cleared Cross
Creek employees of any wrongdoing. Teen Help, which was a
related marketing company we discussed earlier in this episode, further
denied the allegations, telling the paper that it had absolutely
no credibility. Publicly available documents were related to the case
(46:01):
revealed that the lawsuit was dismissed by the trial court.
The plaintiffs, the one suing Cross Creek, repeatedly failed to
comply with orders to hand over evidence for the legal
process of discovery. The plaintiffs appealed, but the appellate court
agreed with the trial court's dismissal, and no judgment of
wrongdoing against Cross Creek was ever made. You see, justice
(46:23):
is complex and multifaceted. We've seen that some steps have
been taken towards holding Cross Creek officials accountable, but it
still leaves the full extent of justice for survivors in limbo.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
That's why we feel it's important to use our platform
here in Trapped in Treatment to make silenced voices heard.
Here's Kirby again.
Speaker 6 (46:46):
One of the things I've learned about human nature is
when we see someone suffering, it's painful for us, so
we want to avoid it, and after a while, people's
eyes just slide past you like you're not even there,
and then you have this problem exist. Am I real
is this happening? Because you're stuck in your own head
and if people around you are reflection of your existence,
(47:09):
then you're no one. And so that was something that
I really had a hard time with. I didn't know
who'd ask for help. There was no one coming to
help me, and I disappeared.
Speaker 2 (47:33):
With the help of Narvin and the Internet, the demand
for Litchfield services was growing at a rapid pace. Inquiries
at Cross Creek were abundant and the number of students
continued to rise. Cross Creek was doing well financially and
inquiries were coming in daily. All of the puzzle pieces
were coming together for Robert, but to grow beyond Majestic
(47:54):
Ranch and Cross Creek, Lichfield would need a reliable way
to get kids into the programs. He continue to open
a processing center of sorts, so he acquired the rights
to manage and operate Brightway Adolescent Hospital, a short term
psychiatric hospital in Saint George, Utah. There, kids would be
evaluated before likely being referred to longer term treatment. Parents
(48:20):
felt like their children were being professionally and independently assessed,
but the thing about evaluations at Brightway was they almost
always led to one of wasp's programs next week on
trapped in treatment.
Speaker 11 (48:37):
It was near freezing when we got out of the
car in Utah, and I was just that just added
to the sense of confusion and shock I was feeling.
When we got up to the door, it had one
of those big, like magnetically locked doors like you sometimes
see like in prison movies and stuff like that, that
(48:58):
had that buzz us in and hear the hair and
then the door kind of swings open, and once it closed,
it was really clear that I was not going to
get out.
Speaker 4 (49:09):
Of that place.
Speaker 2 (49:16):
From records available to us, it appears Cross Creek suddenly
shut down sometime between twenty eleven and twenty thirteen. Public
business records show that the corporate entities associated with the
facility expired between twenty thirteen and twenty fourteen. Further, all
of our efforts to reach Robert Litchfield and Dan Peert
for comment were unsuccessful, and they did not respond to
(49:38):
our request for comment. From our research, neither of them
have ever been charged with or found guilty of any
crimes stemming from allegations of abuse or in connection with
WASP or any of the schools affiliated THEREWITH.
Speaker 12 (49:54):
Hey everyone, it's Paris. Thanks for listening to episode three.
Cross Creek was just the beginning. We want to hear
your thoughts. Use the hashtag trapped in Treatment and tell
us what the most shocking part has been so far,
and make sure to listen to new episodes every week
on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Popular Podcasts
1. Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
2. Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
3. Crime Junkie
If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people.