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ELAINE GORDON TREATMENT CENTER
Report: Suicide attempts, sexual misconduct from poor supervision
March 22, 2001
The Associated Press
PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. - At least
four suicide attempts, repeated sexual misconduct and other
dangerous activities at a youth sex offender program were due to
poor supervision, state records show.
More than 50 reported such
incidents were reported from 1999 through the end of the year 2000
at the Elaine Gordon Treatment Center, a secure unit for up to 50
teen-aged boys convicted of sexual offenses. The center is owned by
the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice.
"We've been taking care of children
for a very long time and we're very good at it," said Donna
Burtanger, spokeswoman for The Brown Schools, the company that
operates the Elaine Gordon center. "We deal with very troubled
youth, a lot can happen in five minutes."
Juvenile justice officials, backed
by a staff review carried out last week, found staff had failed to
properly check on the youths.
"It's an issue that can be
corrected and we expect the provider to take immediate action," said
Darryl Olson, the department's South Florida director of residential
and correction facilities. "The current operation of the facility is
not what I would consider to be satisfactory."
The company is paid $3.4 million a
year to run the center.
Among recent incidents reported at
the center:
_ A juvenile used a piece of
porcelain broken off from a toilet to carve a slogan into his arm,
an injury that required 13 staples to close.
_ Teen-agers have had sex in a
bathroom.
_ Four attempted suicides by one
teen-ager between June and November last year, all but one of them
linked to improper supervision.
Still, Olson said, he feels the
center's problems can be turned around.
"If we get to a point where we have
no reason to believe the facility will improve the operation, or
staff or offenders are at risk, we will terminate," he said. "But
we're definitely not at that point with Elaine Gordon Treatment
Center."
Copyright 2001 Associated Press.
All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast,
rewritten, or redistributed.
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