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Tuesday, February 07, 2006
Open Letter on Child Abuse Task Force
Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
Dear Commissioner Heimlich:
In 2003 and 2004, you were featured in local media stories discussing the need for a task force designed to protect parents from being wrongfully accused of child abuse. I am writing this letter to find out more information about this task force, and to request records (through an open records request) about your own specific involvement in establishing the details of this task force. While I understand the need to protect parents from wrongful accusations, I am concerned about how this task force may relate to rehabilitation facilities with a known record of abusing children, like Kids Helping Kids in Milford.
Kids Helping Kids is associated with the former (and controversial) Straight, Inc. This organization has a long history of using bizarre and abusive, cult-like tactics to modify the behavior of teenagers—some may even call it brainwashing. In fact, the outfit bears a striking resemblance, in this capacity, to the Bill Gothard secular movement of which you are a part. As reported by WISH-TV in Indianapolis, Character Institute “Training Centers” have also been grounds for similar cases of abuse.
In fact, Straight, Inc.‘s “humble pants” bear a striking resemblance to “prayer rooms.” Check out these excerpts:
Just one of many survivors is Samantha Monroe, now a travel agent in Pennsylvania, who told The Montel Williams show this year about overcoming beatings, rape by a counselor, forced hunger, and the confinement to a janitor’s closet in “humble pants”—which contained weeks of her own urine, feces and menstrual blood. During this “timeout,” she gnawed her cheek and spat blood at her overseers.
—from “Ambassador de Sade,” by John Gorenfeld
She tells News 8 she was also locked in the prayer room more than once, “I didn’t get any food or water those five days so that was extremely difficult on me physically as well.”
—from WISH-TV
I mention these things because they provide the context for my questions about your task force.
1. Is this task force still active? If so, in what capacity? How would you describe the nature of its work?
2. In what capacity do these policies that you support also protect places like Kids Helping Kids when they are accused of child abuse?
Thank you for your time in addressing these concerns. I know you value character traits like punctuality and truthfulness, so I am confident you will give me a timely and transparent reply.
Respectfully,
The Dean of Cincinnati
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07 Feb 2006 at 08:55 am | #
Another letter to Phil. You trying to make him do some real work? This might tax and overload his brain!
07 Feb 2006 at 08:15 pm | #
I agree with the comments regarding the above posters issues. I have seen some very controversial news spots done on Kids Helping Kids located in Milford, Ohio. The story aired on channel 9 (WCPO) as an I-Team investigation.
I would also like to know the answers to the questions that the original poster on here has asked. Especially the question asking if this task force would aid in protecting institutions (like kids helping kids) that are abusing children.
Children do not deserve to be abused in the name of drug treatment period. If children are abused on top of a drug addiction problem that they may be having it can cause the children to have only more problems in the future than they had originally started out with.
thank you,
-Concerned in Cincinnati
10 Feb 2006 at 06:15 pm | #
Who is doing this interview and specifically what has prompted this particuar report?
12 Feb 2006 at 09:07 pm | #
As a survivor of the Milford Straight facility, I can personally attest to the bizarre and abusive & cult-like tactics employed to ‘help’ troubled teenagers at KHK. KHK is the same program that Straight Milford was during the 1980’s…the only difference is the name of the program. Knowing full well from personal experience of the outrageous abuses that occurred in Straight, and knowing that child abuse still occurs in KHK to this day, I am extremely concerned about the original writer’s questions. If any task force is shielding KHK from accountability for abusing and brainwashing children, then this must be stopped! KHK must be exposed, not protected! KHK WILL destroy many children even if no one ever lays a hand on the child. KHK’s ‘treatment modality,’ the exact same method used by the former Straight facility, can cause Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). I know this because I have recently been diagnosed with PTSD and had to undergo counseling to recover from my time in Straight 20 years later. I am not the only one that suffers from Straight/KHK induced PTSD. So, to help spare children from emotional, psychological & physical injuries cause by KHK, please follow up on and investigate into the original writer’s questions! Thank you for your time.