May 28, 2024 • 35 mins
Two schools in Northern Mexico put kids through hell, with stories of kids in dog cages and brutal restraints in all sorts of weather. We hear personal testimonies of Marina and Chelsea, two women who spent months at Casa By The Sea and High Impact.
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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, Rebecca Groen.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
And Caroline Cole join us on our journey to uncover
the hidden truths of an industry shrouded in scandal and
lacking injustice. We have one mission to make sure that
no child has to experience the hell that is the
troubled teen industry. This season is all about WASP, the
Worldwide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools, one of the
(00:53):
largest networks of teen programs in the industry, masterminded by
one man, Robert Litchfield. Over the last few weeks, we've
discussed Lichfield's religious upbringing, his introduction to seminars, and the
world of businesses he created in the United States and abroad.
(01:14):
The stories you will hear in the following episode are
the personal allegations and accounts of individuals who have attended
one of these facilities. All experiences, views, and opinions are
their own.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Last week on trapped in treatment. We heard the story
of Bill, a young boy who was first admitted to
Brightway Adolescent Hospital in Utah, which itself became a pipeline
to WASP affiliates around the world. Bill's first night at
Brightway was not exactly the warmest welcome.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
So they put me into the what they called the
seclusion room, which is where they put kids who were
not who are acting up, who are not behaving. It
was a tiny little room. It was so small. There
was a hospital bed in it that had to be
diagonal to like get it all the way in there.
(02:08):
That belt that bad had like seat belt style restraints
on it, which was very ominous to me. There was
a camera in the corner watching U twenty four seve
watching me like all night, and that they locked the
door and that was her I spent the rest.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Of the night. After spending several days at Brightway, Bill
was shipped off to Samoa, a tiny island nation in
the middle of the Pacific Ocean eighteen hundred miles east
of New Zealand and over twenty five hundred miles west
of Hawaii. Talk about the polar opposite of Utah. This
paints a vivid picture of wasp's expanding influence. Robert Litchfield
(02:46):
was setting up his funnel and had a steady stream
of kids entering WASP programs, even though allegations of abuse
began to surface. Litchfield officially incorporated WASP as a legal
entity in nineteen ninety eight, which created a corporate buffer,
allowing the WASP empire to grow despite these challenges. We
(03:06):
know all of this terminology can be confusing. Here's a
helpful way to look at it. In the words of Kenca,
WASP was similar to a trade organization that served and
a quote independently owned and operated schools. These schools were
the member programs that paid a fee back to WASP
(03:26):
in exchange for the WASP affiliation and services. WASP affiliated
programs would begin to open overseas in places like Jamaica,
Czech Republic, Costa Rica, and Samoa, with one of the
most infamous programs opening in the mountains of Mexico. This
program was known as High Impact. High Impact was another
(03:49):
troubled team facility located in tact Mexico, not too far
from Kasa by the Sea. One of the facilities we
learned about in episode one. All the kids had heard
of High Impact, but only a few had ever been there.
It had a horrible reputation at the time. High Impacts
connection to Kasa by the Sea and WASP more generally
(04:11):
was muddy, and in the years that followed, WASP executives
attempted to distance High Impact from the WASP umbrella. However,
as we will explain later, some evidence to the contrary exists. Still,
information about High Impact is not clear, and from our
research we can't tell exactly the year it was opened
(04:32):
or who ran the facility. Chelsea and Marina, who we
heard from in the first episode, both told us they
were sent to High Impact after their stays at Kasa
by the Sea. Chelsea shares her perspective on the purpose
of the secondary facility and it's less than stellar reputation
at COSA. It sounds like it became part of an ultimatum,
(04:53):
almost like a threat.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Essentially, if you weren't progressing in the progress that would
be the threat to most kids. If you don't get
with the program, you're gonna get sent to High Impact.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
According to Chelsea, she remembers kids disappearing from KASA for
weeks or months at a time, and when they returned,
they weren't the same.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
I think a lot of kids were afraid of that
because they saw these kids come back from high impact emaciated, dirty,
their hair in you know, dreadlocks, completely traumatized, hungry. I
(05:39):
remember that was the biggest thing. I was so hungry
when I got When I got back, we could only
eat beans and rice for lunch, slop for breakfast, and
a piece of chicken for dinner. And I probably lost well.
I I went in at like one twenty five, and
(06:03):
I didn't. I came out probably under ninety. Of course
I couldn't weigh myself, but I was real thin. So
I think that it was definitely the threat of high
impact that they used as their marketing for it. I
(06:23):
think for the most part, most kids were not sent there,
but they knew exactly what it meant, and that's what
made them stay and get with the program.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
During our interview with Marina, I wanted to understand what
may have led to her being sent there. She mentioned
something called worksheets, which is essentially the WASP version of detention.
It consists of sitting and writing essays or other monotonous assignments,
and was a place for additional punishment. It was not
somewhere you wanted to be.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
What ended up happening that you were then transported to
High Impact, which was in further in Mexico.
Speaker 5 (07:05):
I don't know what set it off. I was in
worksheets and it had to have been like my third
or fourth essay, five thousand word essay that I didn't
complete and I had to start over. And I had
asked for a time out, and no one was willing
to give it to me because they would never like
even my buddies said, oh no, no one's ever had
a timeout since I've been here, you know, so you
(07:27):
deal with it. I had asked for it. I had
asked for it. I was in worksheets and I lost
my shit. My family was out doing pe, so I
lost my shit and worksheets, walked out and put on
my shoes. I don't know what I did to the
two female staff who followed me out, but I got
my shoes on, so obviously I assaulted them and got
(07:50):
them to get off me. But at that time I
was no longer just being restrained by girls. It was
boys staff too, okay, So I was known to be
one who will flip out and hurt the staff, so
I got my shoes on. I started playing. They cleared
the court clear to everything, and more staff came running
(08:13):
from the boy's side, along with two more females, and
I just remember losing my shit. And every time someone
freaks out or gets restrained. There is a what I
called a shower room. That's what it looked like, the
old eighties tile that's yellow and gross. But it was
right across the way from worksheets, so I was expecting
(08:34):
to literally as they picked me up in the hog
tie position, I expected them to take me there. I
remember them picking me up and I was like, ha ha,
I still got my shoes on, just proud that I
still had them on for no reason other than we
weren't allowed shoes and I still had my shoes on.
And I realized when I came to realize that we're
(08:55):
walking past staff watch and I need to drop my
pride about my shoes and figure out where the fuck
they're taking me. They took me to a family house.
I'm going to warn you ahead of time. I have
been raped before, so that's all that rushed in my
head when they left me alone in a family house
with only a female guarding the door. I was like, no, no, no, no,
(09:18):
no no no no, no no no. I've heard some rumors.
It can't be true. Nope, nope no.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Marina shares that a staff member walked in and she
was immediately on the defensive.
Speaker 5 (09:30):
And I'm like, okay, all the red flags, all the
red flags, great, okay. And I remember looking down and like,
you got your shoes on. Okay, You're good, You're good,
You've got this. And he got into my personal space,
and I just I kind of knew he was so
(09:53):
nice to me, and that man was never nice. He
was calm, his voice was trying to soothe me. He
was just really trying to figure out what was going
on with me. And I don't know how it happened,
but he got into my personal space and I remember
standing up and he continued to stay in my personal space.
So I kicked him in his nuts as hard as
I could. I left the family house by jumping down
(10:17):
the steps, and I remember I'm halfway across the yard,
and all I could think of is, thank God, I
still have my shoes on. Tackled me, restrained me. The
following morning, I was sent to High impact.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Marina's history of abuse likely made her especially vulnerable to
these sorts of situations. We believe that if there had
been a true mental health professional or a trauma specialist
at CASA that met with Marina at that time, they
would have seen that she needed support not to be
locked into a closed room with a man twice her size,
(10:50):
But she says she never met with one, so instead,
Marina was sent on to High Impact, a facility that
captures the experience of being there right in the name.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
High Impact was located in a mountainous area. It's a
small city that had seen many teen treatment programs open
and close over the previous several decades. The grounds were
made up of fenced enclosures and a large tarp tent
with bunk beds on cement. This is where the children slept.
There were few buildings and no amenities. The kids were
(11:26):
exposed to the elements day and night. Chelsea recalls to
the journey to High Impact and some truly horrific practices
the teens were allegedly subjected to.
Speaker 4 (11:39):
I was transported directly from Kasa by the Sea to
High Impact. I remember the drive was actually quite beautiful,
cause by the Sea was in Incinnata, as we know,
it was gorgeous right on the beach.
Speaker 6 (11:56):
And.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
High Impact was in Takata, Mexico. So we passed vineyards
orchards on our way up, and I just remember thinking like,
this is probably the last time I'm actually going to
feel even the slightest bit of happiness, so I better
enjoy it. And you know, sure enough, there wasn't exactly
(12:19):
a scenery at High Impact. There were some similarities between
CASA and High Impact in that they used somewhat of
the same structure. I would say they used more of
the extreme structure. That punishment doesn't fit the crime is
(12:45):
exactly what they were doing there.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
The kids were always on edge, knowing that they could
be physically restrained for the tiniest infraction. But there was
one punishment that took it to another level. The dog cages.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
There were I believe three or four cages at the
front of the facility, and there were always kids in there,
like they just rotated us out. Most of us would
get the whole day, if not the whole day because
(13:26):
they needed to put somebody else in. They would pull
you out and put somebody else in there.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Marina survived the dog cages at high impact for her,
she was allegedly locked in immediately.
Speaker 5 (13:41):
And I was not put into the general population. I
was instantly put into a dog cage. That was my punishment.
So my first week was in the dog cage, the
first week straight, as soon as I got there.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
And you stayed there night and day or how does
that work?
Speaker 5 (13:58):
Explain? Just sleep? They let you sleep inside.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Chelsea describes the alleged conditions inside these crates.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Now in high impact, they held us in dog cages
and we were forced to lay there or sit there
in these stress positions all day long, eight hours a
day in the hot desert sun. Most of us, especially
(14:30):
if we were then restrained and made to lay down
on the hot sand, would lose like sixty percent of
our skin because it would be burned off and we
would have boils everywhere, burns and injuries on our chin,
(14:53):
just rubbed raw from the sand. I mean, the pain
was just indescribable. And you know the use of restraint. Now,
there was restraint in Kassa by the Sea, but I
think that the difference between the restraint in Kassa by
(15:15):
the Sea and other programs we know they used it
in other programs, and the restraint that they used in
High Impact was that the entire point was to put
you through so much pain for so long that you
would just give up, that you would surrender. I mean
(15:37):
literally the point, that's what they would say, surrender, And
like you'd be screaming and saying I can't breathe, and
they would say, if you can't breathe, then how are
you still screaming? The staff would sit on top of
us and this went on for hours and hours, just
(15:59):
pull and manipulating our joints and you know, popping our
arms out of our sockets, and you know, pulling our
hair and grinding our chin into the ground. It was
extremely violent. It was extremely painful, and and that's really
(16:21):
all that it was meant to be. You know. I
think that some programs say that they only use restraint
when it's necessary and that child is a danger to
themselves or others. I can't say that's that's always true,
but I can tell you at High Impact that was
(16:44):
not the point. This was torture. I mean to tell
you that it was traumatic is really kind of like
an understatement because it just it went on and on.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Marina alleges she was in there for a week straight.
She believes the staff was trying to punish her for
her assault of that staff member at Cossa by the Sea,
but she thinks they eventually realized that it wasn't having
the desired effect, so they tried something else. Here's Marina again.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
When they noticed that the dog cage wasn't breaking me, uh,
they put me on my back and my head so
the dog cages are sloped so if it's raining, it
doesn't flood. They put me on my back with my
head at the door, and I passed out multiple times,
just because being in a downward position with your head
at the lowest part's going to happen. So after a
(17:38):
couple times of passing out that day, I literally was like,
I'm ready to work your program. I said that because
I really didn't know what was happening when I lost consciousness.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
To punish a teen by making them be inside a
dog cage for hours on end is one of the
most dehumanizing and shame things I can think of. It
shows that these teens were thought of as less than
a person, that they were not even worthy of respect
or dignity. As horrible as this sounds, for the one
(18:13):
experiencing it. Chelsea shares that it was almost as bad
for those witnessing it. Here's Chelsea.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
Even if you got out of the cage, you would
still be hearing the screams of the other kids that
were in the cage. There were always kids in the cage.
Imagine hearing torture all day long. That's what High Impact was.
There was nothing about High Impact that was therapeutic.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
These methods were on another level, small chain link cages
where kids like Marina were allegedly forced to stay for
hours or days at a time. Marina says the experience
was completely dehumanizing and that she felt like it was
a sore of psychological warfare. In the following she compares
(19:04):
it to torture.
Speaker 5 (19:07):
They didn't even make you like they didn't make you
feel like a human, but they also didn't make you
feel like an animal. I don't know how to explain it.
It was so demoralizing, and it was so it was
genuine torture. I know a lot of people are like, yeah,
the program's torture, and I'm like, High Impact is legitimate
psychological warfare, psychological torture, physical torture, mental torture, emotional torture.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Other survivors have described being held in dog caages two,
both in public interviews and in lawsuits. The cages even
made national news in two thousand and three when Inside
Edition covered WASP in a segment titled Tough Schools. Inside
Editions coverage included aerial footage of High Impact. They clearly
(19:57):
showed teens locked inside chain link kennels roughly six foot
by six foot. At least one team appears to be
bound at the risks with rope. Despite the clear evidence,
WASP leadership denied the brutality. Here's WASP president Ken Kay
describing High Impact during an interview for a PBS Montana
(20:19):
special Who's Watching the Kids, released in twenty ten, seven
years after the Inside Edition footage was aired. At the time,
he denied High Impact was a WASP affiliated school, but
admitted to visiting it himself. The way he describes it,
it doesn't really match up with the way Marina or
Chelsea and so many other survivors online have talked about
(20:42):
High Impact. He plays it down.
Speaker 7 (20:45):
What it looked like a tennis court looked like a
tennis court. It had, it had chain link fence around it.
With that semi private green. I did not see any
dog cages. There no there partitions. There was a a
partition down the middle for I believe one section was
(21:07):
for boys and one section was for girls.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
A tennis court with a semi private green. Sorry, but
this was not a country club. Having seen that footage
from inside Edition, I don't understand how anyone could describe
high impact as looking like a tennis court. And Chelsea
and Marina's experiences sound horrific. The first thought that comes
to my mind is whether the parents of kids knew
(21:33):
this was happening to them.
Speaker 4 (21:34):
We asked Chelsea, now, all of this was happening largely
without our parents' knowledge. We couldn't tell them. All of
our communications were monitored, Our mail was censored, our phone
(21:54):
calls were monitored. We were literally those of us who
had the privilege to call our parents. We had to
call them in the presence of our case manager in
their office, with them sitting right across from you. And
if you said anything that they considered to be manipulation,
(22:16):
they hang up the call and you get in serious trouble.
And I remember when I when I got there, I
wrote a letter to my mom, really explaining to her
what was going on there, telling her that I was
being abused, that I was thirsty, that I was hungry,
(22:38):
you know, please come and get me. And I even
told her about the dog cages.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
But her mom didn't come or possibly didn't receive the letter.
We will never know, but because of its remote location,
very few parents ever came to visit the facility.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
My mom absolutely knew where I was, she just didn't
come to see the facility. She didn't see me in
the facility she I mean, you would think if your
parents actually came and toured the facility first, they'd see
dog cages and deplorable conditions, the fact that we were
(23:22):
made to sleep on a concrete slab with no beds.
Some of us had sleeping bags, others just had a
towel on the floor. You know, if you saw the bathrooms.
I'd love to show you pictures of the bathrooms because
they're just absolutely disgusting. As a parent, you would think,
(23:46):
I have got to get my kid out of here.
This is like and that's what my thoughts were. My
mom would never send me to this place if she knew, so.
I really do think that the program lied to our
parents they even lied to us, But realistically, the reality
(24:11):
of it is that they sent us to this torture
camp and expected us to come back grateful for the experience.
The Mexican authorities flew over the compound in a helicopter
(24:31):
when we were out there, and I'm guessing that was
part of their investigation, because very soon after that High
Impact was rated and shut down. I think that they
had a little bit of foresight that they were about
to get shut down. They just let me graduate all
of a sudden and then sent me back to Cost
(24:53):
by the Sea.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Chelsea spent three months at High Impact, and as mentioned,
believes that she was released because of an impending investigation
by the authorities at the time. Ken k, the then
president of WASP, who he mentioned earlier in the episode,
tried to deny that WASP and High Impact wherever connected. However,
(25:15):
documents obtained from the subsequent federal lawsuits involving WASP and
High Impact show otherwise. Litchfield admitted in a two thousand
and three deposition that R and B Billing, an entity
in which he had ownership, handled the billing at High Impact.
In addition to that High IMPACT's website was hosted on
parent resources dot net, alongside sites for teen Help and WASP.
(25:41):
The phone number on that site was a direct line
to teen Help. Regardless of what ken Ka or any
representative of WASP may have claimed at the time of
their connection to High Impact, many allegations point to the opposite.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
According to Chelsea, she got to speak to one of
the executives of High Impact after the closure.
Speaker 4 (26:01):
The owner of the program, when High Impact got shut down,
and he came back to Kasa and I was able to,
you know, have a conversation with him and actually ask him,
you know, why was High Impact so awful? He told me,
because you had to experience something so awful to make
(26:23):
you feel grateful for what you had at home.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
But did these experiences make survivors feel grateful for what
they had at home? As a WASP survivor myself, I
feel that this attitude suggests a harmful assumption that we
were just ungrateful, spoiled brats and completely ignores that many
of us came from dysfunctional home lives with often complex
(26:48):
trauma histories. In my experience, the harsh, punitive environment at
the facility may have made me appreciate being at home,
but it didn't come close to touching the real res
reasons why I was sent to the program. Chelsea Filer
left Kasa by the Sea in two thousand and three.
A year later, it was raided and also shut down.
(27:10):
Mickey recalls the shutdown vividly. She is another survivor who
had been at KASA for only a few months when
the chaotic scene unfolded.
Speaker 8 (27:20):
I want to say that my entire stay at KASA
was probably significantly improved in most people's because it was
so close to the end. They were under a lot
of scrutiny already. I didn't know that at the time,
but after the close and after I got out of air,
when I researched KASA, they were being looked at by
multiple agencies for child abuse, neglegged stuff like that, which
(27:44):
is why they shut down. And like two days before,
rumors started trickling down and dorm moms were found like
crying in my corners and like whispering to each other,
and rumors started to going down that people were people
were coming to like review the school, and we weren't
(28:08):
sure if we were going to get to stay here.
And at the time I remember talking to the other
like other girls in the family vaguely about well, like
wherever they go? Are they going to send us to
another facility in Mexico? Like, are they going to send
us somewhere else in the United States? Do we just
go home? Some girls were saying that where we're just
(28:30):
gonna end up on the street. Some girls were saying
that we would go on to other places where our
parents were coming. But I don't remember a single adult
ever telling.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Me what was going on.
Speaker 8 (28:43):
The day of Mexican militia came in with guns straight
up into the compound. Like the boys side rioted. I
have absolutely no idea really what happened. I know I
got really violent and like really nasty, and a lot
of stuff was destroyed over there. The girls side, like,
we didn't really go crazy for the most part. We
were like huddled in the computer room. And guys Mexican
(29:05):
militia and like all black came in with like a
heavy weaponry and like looked around the facility and talked
to a whole bunch of people in Spanish and then
stood outside for a couple hours staring at like the perimeter,
talking to a whole bunch of American people. Nobody would
tell us what was going on, and then the door
mom came and said, you have forty eight hours to
leave the country. You've all been like red flags, you
(29:30):
can't go bad. They put us on a bus and
they were bawling their eyes out. So a whole bunch
of like crying teenage girls are looking at these dor
moms that they've known. Some of them have only not
like known them for for like years, at least like
two years. They're girls like Kassa are the clothes that
have been there for two years or more. So all
these women were all that they had known. Like they're
(29:51):
crying in us on buses, So we're crying back at
them because we don't know if we're going to be
safe or not. And they're like, we don't go idea
where you're going. We'll hope you're going to be good.
I don't remember any organization actually happening until we got
to San Diego. Until we got to the other side
of the border and we went to some hotel in
San Diego. There were people that I had never met
(30:11):
before that said that they worked for WASP. That they
started putting us into groups and telling us that our
parents would be contacted and started setting.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
Up phone calls.
Speaker 8 (30:20):
They shuffled us all upstairs into like hotel rooms in
groups of like three and four with a either an
upper level or someone who worked for WASP. I don't remember,
I'm going to go with someone who worked for a
WASP because I think they were a little bit older,
probably in their twenties. She seemed very nice, she had
(30:44):
long hair, don't remember, nick, But they had us all
take a shower, said that they were contacting parents and
we would be staying in the hotel until parents were called.
And I just remember sitting around the hotel room with
a couple other girls, and like slowly, one by one,
(31:04):
like girls from other rooms and girls from that room
would be called and they would go downstairs to their
parents or whatever. And it was like me and like
two or three others still waiting, and they said, we can't.
We haven't been able to get a hold of your parents.
They're not coming. So there, They've sent people to transport
(31:27):
you on to New York.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
They didn't tell Mickey where her parents were or what
they had said. And then the ultimate irony.
Speaker 8 (31:37):
They were in San Francisco at Yeah, that at the parents'
orientation seminar.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Her parents were at the WASP Parents Orientation Seminar at
the time this all happened, which is.
Speaker 8 (31:50):
What like eight to ten hours from San Diego. So
the fact that they couldn't find my parents, or that
they couldn't send my parents to come get me is like.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Astronomical the parents seminars or something. We will be breaking
down in a later episode, But at the time, none
of it made sense to Mickey. All she knew was
that she was on the move again.
Speaker 8 (32:10):
My parents hired a transport team, married couple mid thirties
to take me to New York.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
According to our research, High Impact was closed in two
thousand and two and Kasa by the Sea was closed
in September two thousand and four after investigations by Mexican authorities.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Kasa by the Sea and High Impact are two of
the most storied facilities in wasp's history. At the time
Kasa was shut down, both Robert Litchfield and kin Ka
publicly denied all allegations of abuse, torture, and neglect by
students who attended these facilities. In fact, Kink told reporters
(32:56):
that the raid of Kasa was unjustified and there were
no substantial cases of abuse.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
However, a pattern was clearly starting to develop. Facilities opened
by those close to or connected to Lichfield would open
for a bit in places far from Utah, seemingly make
a lot of money for short periods of time, and
then shut down with little consequences for the people who
ran them. The consequences seemed to be reserved for the
(33:26):
kids like Chelsea and Marina and Mickey.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Mickey would end up in New York at the same
facility I went to the Academy at Ivy Ridge. I
actually remember when she arrived, and I knew the hell
she was in for because Ivy Ridge ruined my teen
years and my family. In next week's episode, it's time
(33:51):
to tell my story, you'll hear about how I was
sent three thousand miles away from my family, disconnected from
the outside world world, and kept against my will within
the walls of the Academy at Ivy Rich. So far,
you've heard stories from survivors, but for this episode, we
(34:12):
felt it was important to bring a different perspective. For
the first time. My mom will share her side of
the story next time. On Trapped in Treatment.
Speaker 6 (34:26):
You know, I feel like they really capitalized on our
pain and sorrow and the problems we were going through.
They capitalized on that, and yeah, so it was time.
As of the essence, either they were filling up or
(34:47):
really looking back on it now the guilt trips. Do
you want to be responsible? So have our say your
daughter's death. It's a terrible fraud on people who are
so desperate for help.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
All of our efforts to reach Robert Litchfield and Ken
Kay for comment were unsuccessful, and they did not respond
to our requests for comment. From our research, neither of
them have ever been charged with or found guilty of
any crime stemming from allegations of abuse or in connection
with WASP or any of the schools affiliated therewith.
Speaker 6 (35:33):
Hey everyone, it's Paris.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
Thanks for listening to episode five.
Speaker 5 (35:36):
The subject matter in our show can be hard to
listen to, so make sure you're practicing self care.
Speaker 3 (35:42):
And for everyone out there who's experienced abuse within the TTI,
I see you survivor.
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, Rebecca Groen.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
And Caroline Cole join us on our journey to uncover
the hidden truths of an industry shrouded in scandal and
lacking injustice. We have one mission to make sure that
no child has to experience the hell that is the
troubled teen industry. This season is all about WASP, the
Worldwide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools, one of the
(00:53):
largest networks of teen programs in the industry, masterminded by
one man, Robert Litchfield. Over the last few weeks, we've
discussed Lichfield's religious upbringing, his introduction to seminars, and the
world of businesses he created in the United States and abroad.
(01:14):
The stories you will hear in the following episode are
the personal allegations and accounts of individuals who have attended
one of these facilities. All experiences, views, and opinions are
their own.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Last week on trapped in treatment. We heard the story
of Bill, a young boy who was first admitted to
Brightway Adolescent Hospital in Utah, which itself became a pipeline
to WASP affiliates around the world. Bill's first night at
Brightway was not exactly the warmest welcome.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
So they put me into the what they called the
seclusion room, which is where they put kids who were
not who are acting up, who are not behaving. It
was a tiny little room. It was so small. There
was a hospital bed in it that had to be
diagonal to like get it all the way in there.
(02:08):
That belt that bad had like seat belt style restraints
on it, which was very ominous to me. There was
a camera in the corner watching U twenty four seve
watching me like all night, and that they locked the
door and that was her I spent the rest.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Of the night. After spending several days at Brightway, Bill
was shipped off to Samoa, a tiny island nation in
the middle of the Pacific Ocean eighteen hundred miles east
of New Zealand and over twenty five hundred miles west
of Hawaii. Talk about the polar opposite of Utah. This
paints a vivid picture of wasp's expanding influence. Robert Litchfield
(02:46):
was setting up his funnel and had a steady stream
of kids entering WASP programs, even though allegations of abuse
began to surface. Litchfield officially incorporated WASP as a legal
entity in nineteen ninety eight, which created a corporate buffer,
allowing the WASP empire to grow despite these challenges. We
(03:06):
know all of this terminology can be confusing. Here's a
helpful way to look at it. In the words of Kenca,
WASP was similar to a trade organization that served and
a quote independently owned and operated schools. These schools were
the member programs that paid a fee back to WASP
(03:26):
in exchange for the WASP affiliation and services. WASP affiliated
programs would begin to open overseas in places like Jamaica,
Czech Republic, Costa Rica, and Samoa, with one of the
most infamous programs opening in the mountains of Mexico. This
program was known as High Impact. High Impact was another
(03:49):
troubled team facility located in tact Mexico, not too far
from Kasa by the Sea. One of the facilities we
learned about in episode one. All the kids had heard
of High Impact, but only a few had ever been there.
It had a horrible reputation at the time. High Impacts
connection to Kasa by the Sea and WASP more generally
(04:11):
was muddy, and in the years that followed, WASP executives
attempted to distance High Impact from the WASP umbrella. However,
as we will explain later, some evidence to the contrary exists. Still,
information about High Impact is not clear, and from our
research we can't tell exactly the year it was opened
(04:32):
or who ran the facility. Chelsea and Marina, who we
heard from in the first episode, both told us they
were sent to High Impact after their stays at Kasa
by the Sea. Chelsea shares her perspective on the purpose
of the secondary facility and it's less than stellar reputation
at COSA. It sounds like it became part of an ultimatum,
(04:53):
almost like a threat.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Essentially, if you weren't progressing in the progress that would
be the threat to most kids. If you don't get
with the program, you're gonna get sent to High Impact.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
According to Chelsea, she remembers kids disappearing from KASA for
weeks or months at a time, and when they returned,
they weren't the same.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
I think a lot of kids were afraid of that
because they saw these kids come back from high impact emaciated, dirty,
their hair in you know, dreadlocks, completely traumatized, hungry. I
(05:39):
remember that was the biggest thing. I was so hungry
when I got When I got back, we could only
eat beans and rice for lunch, slop for breakfast, and
a piece of chicken for dinner. And I probably lost well.
I I went in at like one twenty five, and
(06:03):
I didn't. I came out probably under ninety. Of course
I couldn't weigh myself, but I was real thin. So
I think that it was definitely the threat of high
impact that they used as their marketing for it. I
(06:23):
think for the most part, most kids were not sent there,
but they knew exactly what it meant, and that's what
made them stay and get with the program.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
During our interview with Marina, I wanted to understand what
may have led to her being sent there. She mentioned
something called worksheets, which is essentially the WASP version of detention.
It consists of sitting and writing essays or other monotonous assignments,
and was a place for additional punishment. It was not
somewhere you wanted to be.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
What ended up happening that you were then transported to
High Impact, which was in further in Mexico.
Speaker 5 (07:05):
I don't know what set it off. I was in
worksheets and it had to have been like my third
or fourth essay, five thousand word essay that I didn't
complete and I had to start over. And I had
asked for a time out, and no one was willing
to give it to me because they would never like
even my buddies said, oh no, no one's ever had
a timeout since I've been here, you know, so you
(07:27):
deal with it. I had asked for it. I had
asked for it. I was in worksheets and I lost
my shit. My family was out doing pe, so I
lost my shit and worksheets, walked out and put on
my shoes. I don't know what I did to the
two female staff who followed me out, but I got
my shoes on, so obviously I assaulted them and got
(07:50):
them to get off me. But at that time I
was no longer just being restrained by girls. It was
boys staff too, okay, So I was known to be
one who will flip out and hurt the staff, so
I got my shoes on. I started playing. They cleared
the court clear to everything, and more staff came running
(08:13):
from the boy's side, along with two more females, and
I just remember losing my shit. And every time someone
freaks out or gets restrained. There is a what I
called a shower room. That's what it looked like, the
old eighties tile that's yellow and gross. But it was
right across the way from worksheets, so I was expecting
(08:34):
to literally as they picked me up in the hog
tie position, I expected them to take me there. I
remember them picking me up and I was like, ha ha,
I still got my shoes on, just proud that I
still had them on for no reason other than we
weren't allowed shoes and I still had my shoes on.
And I realized when I came to realize that we're
(08:55):
walking past staff watch and I need to drop my
pride about my shoes and figure out where the fuck
they're taking me. They took me to a family house.
I'm going to warn you ahead of time. I have
been raped before, so that's all that rushed in my
head when they left me alone in a family house
with only a female guarding the door. I was like, no, no, no, no,
(09:18):
no no no no, no no no. I've heard some rumors.
It can't be true. Nope, nope no.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Marina shares that a staff member walked in and she
was immediately on the defensive.
Speaker 5 (09:30):
And I'm like, okay, all the red flags, all the
red flags, great, okay. And I remember looking down and like,
you got your shoes on. Okay, You're good, You're good,
You've got this. And he got into my personal space,
and I just I kind of knew he was so
(09:53):
nice to me, and that man was never nice. He
was calm, his voice was trying to soothe me. He
was just really trying to figure out what was going
on with me. And I don't know how it happened,
but he got into my personal space and I remember
standing up and he continued to stay in my personal space.
So I kicked him in his nuts as hard as
I could. I left the family house by jumping down
(10:17):
the steps, and I remember I'm halfway across the yard,
and all I could think of is, thank God, I
still have my shoes on. Tackled me, restrained me. The
following morning, I was sent to High impact.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Marina's history of abuse likely made her especially vulnerable to
these sorts of situations. We believe that if there had
been a true mental health professional or a trauma specialist
at CASA that met with Marina at that time, they
would have seen that she needed support not to be
locked into a closed room with a man twice her size,
(10:50):
But she says she never met with one, so instead,
Marina was sent on to High Impact, a facility that
captures the experience of being there right in the name.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
High Impact was located in a mountainous area. It's a
small city that had seen many teen treatment programs open
and close over the previous several decades. The grounds were
made up of fenced enclosures and a large tarp tent
with bunk beds on cement. This is where the children slept.
There were few buildings and no amenities. The kids were
(11:26):
exposed to the elements day and night. Chelsea recalls to
the journey to High Impact and some truly horrific practices
the teens were allegedly subjected to.
Speaker 4 (11:39):
I was transported directly from Kasa by the Sea to
High Impact. I remember the drive was actually quite beautiful,
cause by the Sea was in Incinnata, as we know,
it was gorgeous right on the beach.
Speaker 6 (11:56):
And.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
High Impact was in Takata, Mexico. So we passed vineyards
orchards on our way up, and I just remember thinking like,
this is probably the last time I'm actually going to
feel even the slightest bit of happiness, so I better
enjoy it. And you know, sure enough, there wasn't exactly
(12:19):
a scenery at High Impact. There were some similarities between
CASA and High Impact in that they used somewhat of
the same structure. I would say they used more of
the extreme structure. That punishment doesn't fit the crime is
(12:45):
exactly what they were doing there.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
The kids were always on edge, knowing that they could
be physically restrained for the tiniest infraction. But there was
one punishment that took it to another level. The dog cages.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
There were I believe three or four cages at the
front of the facility, and there were always kids in there,
like they just rotated us out. Most of us would
get the whole day, if not the whole day because
(13:26):
they needed to put somebody else in. They would pull
you out and put somebody else in there.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Marina survived the dog cages at high impact for her,
she was allegedly locked in immediately.
Speaker 5 (13:41):
And I was not put into the general population. I
was instantly put into a dog cage. That was my punishment.
So my first week was in the dog cage, the
first week straight, as soon as I got there.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
And you stayed there night and day or how does
that work?
Speaker 5 (13:58):
Explain? Just sleep? They let you sleep inside.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Chelsea describes the alleged conditions inside these crates.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Now in high impact, they held us in dog cages
and we were forced to lay there or sit there
in these stress positions all day long, eight hours a
day in the hot desert sun. Most of us, especially
(14:30):
if we were then restrained and made to lay down
on the hot sand, would lose like sixty percent of
our skin because it would be burned off and we
would have boils everywhere, burns and injuries on our chin,
(14:53):
just rubbed raw from the sand. I mean, the pain
was just indescribable. And you know the use of restraint. Now,
there was restraint in Kassa by the Sea, but I
think that the difference between the restraint in Kassa by
(15:15):
the Sea and other programs we know they used it
in other programs, and the restraint that they used in
High Impact was that the entire point was to put
you through so much pain for so long that you
would just give up, that you would surrender. I mean
(15:37):
literally the point, that's what they would say, surrender, And
like you'd be screaming and saying I can't breathe, and
they would say, if you can't breathe, then how are
you still screaming? The staff would sit on top of
us and this went on for hours and hours, just
(15:59):
pull and manipulating our joints and you know, popping our
arms out of our sockets, and you know, pulling our
hair and grinding our chin into the ground. It was
extremely violent. It was extremely painful, and and that's really
(16:21):
all that it was meant to be. You know. I
think that some programs say that they only use restraint
when it's necessary and that child is a danger to
themselves or others. I can't say that's that's always true,
but I can tell you at High Impact that was
(16:44):
not the point. This was torture. I mean to tell
you that it was traumatic is really kind of like
an understatement because it just it went on and on.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Marina alleges she was in there for a week straight.
She believes the staff was trying to punish her for
her assault of that staff member at Cossa by the Sea,
but she thinks they eventually realized that it wasn't having
the desired effect, so they tried something else. Here's Marina again.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
When they noticed that the dog cage wasn't breaking me, uh,
they put me on my back and my head so
the dog cages are sloped so if it's raining, it
doesn't flood. They put me on my back with my
head at the door, and I passed out multiple times,
just because being in a downward position with your head
at the lowest part's going to happen. So after a
(17:38):
couple times of passing out that day, I literally was like,
I'm ready to work your program. I said that because
I really didn't know what was happening when I lost consciousness.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
To punish a teen by making them be inside a
dog cage for hours on end is one of the
most dehumanizing and shame things I can think of. It
shows that these teens were thought of as less than
a person, that they were not even worthy of respect
or dignity. As horrible as this sounds, for the one
(18:13):
experiencing it. Chelsea shares that it was almost as bad
for those witnessing it. Here's Chelsea.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
Even if you got out of the cage, you would
still be hearing the screams of the other kids that
were in the cage. There were always kids in the cage.
Imagine hearing torture all day long. That's what High Impact was.
There was nothing about High Impact that was therapeutic.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
These methods were on another level, small chain link cages
where kids like Marina were allegedly forced to stay for
hours or days at a time. Marina says the experience
was completely dehumanizing and that she felt like it was
a sore of psychological warfare. In the following she compares
(19:04):
it to torture.
Speaker 5 (19:07):
They didn't even make you like they didn't make you
feel like a human, but they also didn't make you
feel like an animal. I don't know how to explain it.
It was so demoralizing, and it was so it was
genuine torture. I know a lot of people are like, yeah,
the program's torture, and I'm like, High Impact is legitimate
psychological warfare, psychological torture, physical torture, mental torture, emotional torture.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Other survivors have described being held in dog caages two,
both in public interviews and in lawsuits. The cages even
made national news in two thousand and three when Inside
Edition covered WASP in a segment titled Tough Schools. Inside
Editions coverage included aerial footage of High Impact. They clearly
(19:57):
showed teens locked inside chain link kennels roughly six foot
by six foot. At least one team appears to be
bound at the risks with rope. Despite the clear evidence,
WASP leadership denied the brutality. Here's WASP president Ken Kay
describing High Impact during an interview for a PBS Montana
(20:19):
special Who's Watching the Kids, released in twenty ten, seven
years after the Inside Edition footage was aired. At the time,
he denied High Impact was a WASP affiliated school, but
admitted to visiting it himself. The way he describes it,
it doesn't really match up with the way Marina or
Chelsea and so many other survivors online have talked about
(20:42):
High Impact. He plays it down.
Speaker 7 (20:45):
What it looked like a tennis court looked like a
tennis court. It had, it had chain link fence around it.
With that semi private green. I did not see any
dog cages. There no there partitions. There was a a
partition down the middle for I believe one section was
(21:07):
for boys and one section was for girls.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
A tennis court with a semi private green. Sorry, but
this was not a country club. Having seen that footage
from inside Edition, I don't understand how anyone could describe
high impact as looking like a tennis court. And Chelsea
and Marina's experiences sound horrific. The first thought that comes
to my mind is whether the parents of kids knew
(21:33):
this was happening to them.
Speaker 4 (21:34):
We asked Chelsea, now, all of this was happening largely
without our parents' knowledge. We couldn't tell them. All of
our communications were monitored, Our mail was censored, our phone
(21:54):
calls were monitored. We were literally those of us who
had the privilege to call our parents. We had to
call them in the presence of our case manager in
their office, with them sitting right across from you. And
if you said anything that they considered to be manipulation,
(22:16):
they hang up the call and you get in serious trouble.
And I remember when I when I got there, I
wrote a letter to my mom, really explaining to her
what was going on there, telling her that I was
being abused, that I was thirsty, that I was hungry,
(22:38):
you know, please come and get me. And I even
told her about the dog cages.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
But her mom didn't come or possibly didn't receive the letter.
We will never know, but because of its remote location,
very few parents ever came to visit the facility.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
My mom absolutely knew where I was, she just didn't
come to see the facility. She didn't see me in
the facility she I mean, you would think if your
parents actually came and toured the facility first, they'd see
dog cages and deplorable conditions, the fact that we were
(23:22):
made to sleep on a concrete slab with no beds.
Some of us had sleeping bags, others just had a
towel on the floor. You know, if you saw the bathrooms.
I'd love to show you pictures of the bathrooms because
they're just absolutely disgusting. As a parent, you would think,
(23:46):
I have got to get my kid out of here.
This is like and that's what my thoughts were. My
mom would never send me to this place if she knew, so.
I really do think that the program lied to our
parents they even lied to us, But realistically, the reality
(24:11):
of it is that they sent us to this torture
camp and expected us to come back grateful for the experience.
The Mexican authorities flew over the compound in a helicopter
(24:31):
when we were out there, and I'm guessing that was
part of their investigation, because very soon after that High
Impact was rated and shut down. I think that they
had a little bit of foresight that they were about
to get shut down. They just let me graduate all
of a sudden and then sent me back to Cost
(24:53):
by the Sea.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Chelsea spent three months at High Impact, and as mentioned,
believes that she was released because of an impending investigation
by the authorities at the time. Ken k, the then
president of WASP, who he mentioned earlier in the episode,
tried to deny that WASP and High Impact wherever connected. However,
(25:15):
documents obtained from the subsequent federal lawsuits involving WASP and
High Impact show otherwise. Litchfield admitted in a two thousand
and three deposition that R and B Billing, an entity
in which he had ownership, handled the billing at High Impact.
In addition to that High IMPACT's website was hosted on
parent resources dot net, alongside sites for teen Help and WASP.
(25:41):
The phone number on that site was a direct line
to teen Help. Regardless of what ken Ka or any
representative of WASP may have claimed at the time of
their connection to High Impact, many allegations point to the opposite.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
According to Chelsea, she got to speak to one of
the executives of High Impact after the closure.
Speaker 4 (26:01):
The owner of the program, when High Impact got shut down,
and he came back to Kasa and I was able to,
you know, have a conversation with him and actually ask him,
you know, why was High Impact so awful? He told me,
because you had to experience something so awful to make
(26:23):
you feel grateful for what you had at home.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
But did these experiences make survivors feel grateful for what
they had at home? As a WASP survivor myself, I
feel that this attitude suggests a harmful assumption that we
were just ungrateful, spoiled brats and completely ignores that many
of us came from dysfunctional home lives with often complex
(26:48):
trauma histories. In my experience, the harsh, punitive environment at
the facility may have made me appreciate being at home,
but it didn't come close to touching the real res
reasons why I was sent to the program. Chelsea Filer
left Kasa by the Sea in two thousand and three.
A year later, it was raided and also shut down.
(27:10):
Mickey recalls the shutdown vividly. She is another survivor who
had been at KASA for only a few months when
the chaotic scene unfolded.
Speaker 8 (27:20):
I want to say that my entire stay at KASA
was probably significantly improved in most people's because it was
so close to the end. They were under a lot
of scrutiny already. I didn't know that at the time,
but after the close and after I got out of air,
when I researched KASA, they were being looked at by
multiple agencies for child abuse, neglegged stuff like that, which
(27:44):
is why they shut down. And like two days before,
rumors started trickling down and dorm moms were found like
crying in my corners and like whispering to each other,
and rumors started to going down that people were people
were coming to like review the school, and we weren't
(28:08):
sure if we were going to get to stay here.
And at the time I remember talking to the other
like other girls in the family vaguely about well, like
wherever they go? Are they going to send us to
another facility in Mexico? Like, are they going to send
us somewhere else in the United States? Do we just
go home? Some girls were saying that where we're just
(28:30):
gonna end up on the street. Some girls were saying
that we would go on to other places where our
parents were coming. But I don't remember a single adult
ever telling.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Me what was going on.
Speaker 8 (28:43):
The day of Mexican militia came in with guns straight
up into the compound. Like the boys side rioted. I
have absolutely no idea really what happened. I know I
got really violent and like really nasty, and a lot
of stuff was destroyed over there. The girls side, like,
we didn't really go crazy for the most part. We
were like huddled in the computer room. And guys Mexican
(29:05):
militia and like all black came in with like a
heavy weaponry and like looked around the facility and talked
to a whole bunch of people in Spanish and then
stood outside for a couple hours staring at like the perimeter,
talking to a whole bunch of American people. Nobody would
tell us what was going on, and then the door
mom came and said, you have forty eight hours to
leave the country. You've all been like red flags, you
(29:30):
can't go bad. They put us on a bus and
they were bawling their eyes out. So a whole bunch
of like crying teenage girls are looking at these dor
moms that they've known. Some of them have only not
like known them for for like years, at least like
two years. They're girls like Kassa are the clothes that
have been there for two years or more. So all
these women were all that they had known. Like they're
(29:51):
crying in us on buses, So we're crying back at
them because we don't know if we're going to be
safe or not. And they're like, we don't go idea
where you're going. We'll hope you're going to be good.
I don't remember any organization actually happening until we got
to San Diego. Until we got to the other side
of the border and we went to some hotel in
San Diego. There were people that I had never met
(30:11):
before that said that they worked for WASP. That they
started putting us into groups and telling us that our
parents would be contacted and started setting.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
Up phone calls.
Speaker 8 (30:20):
They shuffled us all upstairs into like hotel rooms in
groups of like three and four with a either an
upper level or someone who worked for WASP. I don't remember,
I'm going to go with someone who worked for a
WASP because I think they were a little bit older,
probably in their twenties. She seemed very nice, she had
(30:44):
long hair, don't remember, nick, But they had us all
take a shower, said that they were contacting parents and
we would be staying in the hotel until parents were called.
And I just remember sitting around the hotel room with
a couple other girls, and like slowly, one by one,
(31:04):
like girls from other rooms and girls from that room
would be called and they would go downstairs to their
parents or whatever. And it was like me and like
two or three others still waiting, and they said, we can't.
We haven't been able to get a hold of your parents.
They're not coming. So there, They've sent people to transport
(31:27):
you on to New York.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
They didn't tell Mickey where her parents were or what
they had said. And then the ultimate irony.
Speaker 8 (31:37):
They were in San Francisco at Yeah, that at the parents'
orientation seminar.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Her parents were at the WASP Parents Orientation Seminar at
the time this all happened, which is.
Speaker 8 (31:50):
What like eight to ten hours from San Diego. So
the fact that they couldn't find my parents, or that
they couldn't send my parents to come get me is like.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Astronomical the parents seminars or something. We will be breaking
down in a later episode, But at the time, none
of it made sense to Mickey. All she knew was
that she was on the move again.
Speaker 8 (32:10):
My parents hired a transport team, married couple mid thirties
to take me to New York.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
According to our research, High Impact was closed in two
thousand and two and Kasa by the Sea was closed
in September two thousand and four after investigations by Mexican authorities.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Kasa by the Sea and High Impact are two of
the most storied facilities in wasp's history. At the time
Kasa was shut down, both Robert Litchfield and kin Ka
publicly denied all allegations of abuse, torture, and neglect by
students who attended these facilities. In fact, Kink told reporters
(32:56):
that the raid of Kasa was unjustified and there were
no substantial cases of abuse.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
However, a pattern was clearly starting to develop. Facilities opened
by those close to or connected to Lichfield would open
for a bit in places far from Utah, seemingly make
a lot of money for short periods of time, and
then shut down with little consequences for the people who
ran them. The consequences seemed to be reserved for the
(33:26):
kids like Chelsea and Marina and Mickey.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Mickey would end up in New York at the same
facility I went to the Academy at Ivy Ridge. I
actually remember when she arrived, and I knew the hell
she was in for because Ivy Ridge ruined my teen
years and my family. In next week's episode, it's time
(33:51):
to tell my story, you'll hear about how I was
sent three thousand miles away from my family, disconnected from
the outside world world, and kept against my will within
the walls of the Academy at Ivy Rich. So far,
you've heard stories from survivors, but for this episode, we
(34:12):
felt it was important to bring a different perspective. For
the first time. My mom will share her side of
the story next time. On Trapped in Treatment.
Speaker 6 (34:26):
You know, I feel like they really capitalized on our
pain and sorrow and the problems we were going through.
They capitalized on that, and yeah, so it was time.
As of the essence, either they were filling up or
(34:47):
really looking back on it now the guilt trips. Do
you want to be responsible? So have our say your
daughter's death. It's a terrible fraud on people who are
so desperate for help.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
All of our efforts to reach Robert Litchfield and Ken
Kay for comment were unsuccessful, and they did not respond
to our requests for comment. From our research, neither of
them have ever been charged with or found guilty of
any crime stemming from allegations of abuse or in connection
with WASP or any of the schools affiliated therewith.
Speaker 6 (35:33):
Hey everyone, it's Paris.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
Thanks for listening to episode five.
Speaker 5 (35:36):
The subject matter in our show can be hard to
listen to, so make sure you're practicing self care.
Speaker 3 (35:42):
And for everyone out there who's experienced abuse within the TTI,
I see you survivor.
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