On Feb 20th 2012, Dr. Drew Pinsky, a popular drug rehab specialist, producer, radio show personality and “doctor to the stars” (as seen on Celebrity Rehab) ran a show on his program Life Changers about a mother who gave her son an unusual punishment for his behavior; She made him stand out on the street corner and wear a sign that said “I lie, I steal, I sell drugs, I don’t follow the law”.
Mom Publicly Humiliates Her ‘Out of Control Son”
As the story comes to a close, Dr. Drew offers this mother an “opportunity” to save her son’s future by receiving 12 months free tuition to Diamond Ranch Academy, to which she did not immediately accept.
Dr. Drew then began to pressure her to make a hasty decision, playing on her emotions and fear for her son by insisting that Diamond Ranch Academy was “Specifically what kids like him need” and telling her that it was “shocking” that she would not immediately enroll her son into this program solely based on his recommendation. I personally must applaud this mother for her hesitation, her son is only 14 and this was the first time she had found him in trouble, She was not ready give up being this child’s parent and for that, she deserves a mother of the year award! To think that Dr. Drew not only encourages this mother to abandon her child for the next year of his life, but also shames her for the act of believing in his ability to change his behavior is what is truly shocking.
The truth is, Diamond Ranch Academy is not a therapeutic boarding school, it is a behavior modification program that employs techniques of seclusion, forced labor, physical violence, fear based control and brainwashing techniques that violate all basic human rights and could certainly be considered child abuse, if not actual torture. Aversive behavior control has been proven to be ineffective in most cases and severely harmful in others, and has a long history of causing determential long term effects including symptoms of PTSD, and in most cases, relapse.
Survivors of this school have spoken out:
“They had a punishment in which you were outside from 6:15 am to 8:15 pm, doing manual labor, pulling a heavy cart around for miles, in total silence, and permission had to be asked to do anything. Literally, anything. You were in line of sight of a staff twenty-four seven. One kid said something mildly disrespectful, and ended up out there for a week.” –DRA Survivor 2010-2011
As well, descriptions of the misuse of restraints and seclusion that were dolled out for punitive reasons, lead me to recognize the pattern of abuse that I had suffered as a child enrolled in one of these programs. I can tell you from my own experience that it is nothing short of terrifying. You literally feel like you are going to die, soffocate to death under the weight of the staff member who digs their knee into your spine, holds your arms painfully extended behind your back and grinds your chin into the concrete. You cannot tell me that this isn’t abuse, espeically when these “restraints” are given out for reasons such as:
· Breaking a program rule, saying something disrespectful, cursing, or making a face. –DRA Survivors 2005-2007, 2009-2010, 2010-2011, 2011
· 1.“Not consenting to a strip search 2. Not being able to push the cart 3. Talking back 4. Not walking around the track” “for 20-30 minutes at a time” which resulted in “a cyst formed on my wrist.” -DRA Survivor 2005 – 2007
· “Secluded because of “not doing what im told” -DRA Survivor 2005 – 2007
In my experience, the rules and regulations of these programs are punitive at best, and ultimately set these kids up to fail, and be punished. “Not following directions” could mean something as simple as looking out the window, or forgetting your pen and can surmount to loss of privileges to do school work forced into isolation for weeks at a time or physically restrained. These punishments are misused in a way that strikes absolute fear in the minds of these children, they feel as if they are living in hell 24-7 with no escape and no access to ask for help. Correspondence with family is monitored and strictly censored, students are punished for “manipulating” if they say anything negative about the program or ask to go home.
“You couldn’t write your parents but once a week and you couldn’t say anything about being restrained or going home. You only got one 15 min. phone call every two weeks only to your legal guardians.” –DRA Survivor 2007
These programs allow no access to the outside world, or family members who may be able to act on their behalf, and certainly not advocates. That means that if a child is being abused, they will only be abused further if they reach out to anyone for help.
Until these practices are abolished, there is absolutely no trusting Diamond Ranch Academy and the Troubled Teen Industry. Their history is shroud in abuse, deceit and manipulation on par with full fledged cults, in that every aspect of these families lives and relationships are being controlled by the program. Blind loyalty is not only encouraged, it is vehemently enforced by the parent “workshops” or seminars, where parents are made to believe that their child could actually die without the program. To the contrary,b there are no legitimate statistics to support this belief rather the statistics show that more teens are liable to commit suicide than to fall victim to drug overdose or gang activity. Furthermore, placing a child with crippling depression and suicidal tendencies into such a hostile environment could only increase the desire and chances of succeeding such an attempt.
“I had three suicide attempts there. After each attempt, I was treated like dirt, and punished. No psychiatric help was offered. No sort of therapy ensued until well after.” –DRA Survivor
In any event, therapy is not what these kids are getting, and parents would be wise to see through the shameless marketing techniques of Diamond Ranch Academy and the many programs out there that run a similar, abusive system. No teen, no matter their faults deserves to be abused in the name of treatment, certainly not those who already struggle with mental disorders. Programs like Diamond Ranch Academy who claim to treat a whole range of disorders and behaviors are simply lieing to you, they are neither qualified nor is their program designed to properly care for those with special needs or acute behavior disorders nor is it a suitable option for adolescents with drug addictions. These programs are so desperate for your money that they will enroll your teen even in absence of any abnormal teenage behaviors, as long as you can write checks, they will incarcerate your teen.
It is up to the parents to educate themselves, to do diligent research and to avoid sending their child away to any program, at any cost. There are many resources for teen help that can be found in your local communities, you do not have to send your child away to find care and adequate treatment. The fact that a clinical professional like Dr. Drew would endorse such a program truly shocks and disappoints me, I once thought highly of him, now I have lost any and all respect for him. He is shamelessly advertising for this program without doing any prior research into it’s practices and efficiency in treatment. He of all people should know better that there is no “miracle cure” for adolescent behavior, and the idea that a 14 year old could be so addicted to drugs that he should be forced into treatment without consent or due process is simply a violation of our Constitution and basic human rights.
Dr. Drew should be ashamed of himself, facilitating such promotions, advocating child abuse as drug treatment and quite possibly taking kick backs for every child he has sent to these teen prisons. A violation of his trust as a medical professional and a shameful misuse of his influence as a public figure, the same act of which that earned a certain judge a 28 year prison sentence. I implore Dr. Drew and his producers, the CW Network to pull their endorsements from Diamond Ranch Academy and any other programs utilizing aversive behavior modification methods, because it is simply dangerous and certainly unprofessional to encourage the abuse of children, in any severity for any reason. Until the endorsements are pulled I and the hordes of survivors of the troubled teen industry intend to ruthlessly pursue this campaign against Dr. Drew and Diamond Ranch Academy.
For more information please visit CAFETY’s Campaign to educate Dr Drew: Diamond Ranch Academy, Survivors Voices
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/UTSanDiego/obituary.aspx?n=james-shirey&pid=122874456&fb_source=message
This is an obit of a 15 year old boy who died of a “sudden illness” at Diamond Ranch Academy. I am interested to know what really happened to him and if Diamond Ranch Academy had any hand in his death.
All too often you hear kids dying of preventible illnesses in these schools because their health concerns and pleas for help are dismissed as manipulation. Doing hard labor in the fields for weeks at a time without proper food, water or rest breaks is what causes kids to die of dehydration. I would like to dig deeper into this, find this child’s autopsy report and clarify as to what kind of “sudden illness” can claim the life of a healthy teen boy.
I sent my daughter to DRA when we became unsuccessful as parents to get her to stop self destructive behaviors. It took her about 15 months to graduate from the program. She came back to us as a totally changed person. (For the good!) Had it not been for the efforts of this program I don’t know if I would even have a daughter right now. Or worse yet, I believe she would likely have been addicted to drugs, had a teenage pregnancy, or some serious kind of STD which could have damaged her for the rest of her life.
As she will attest, it was not an easy program and there were a lot of severe consequences for improper behavior; however, I would not call any of the consequences abusive. Parents who usually consider these consequences abusive have troubled teens for the lack of consequences in their homes. I feel it was better to have these consequences learned in a controlled, safe environment than the natural consequences that the world hands out for poor choices. I.e. jail time with thugs, disease, drug over dose, unwanted pregnancies, ETC.
My daughter came back to me changed and ready to continue her life with the tools needed to make good choices and be able to say “no” to bad or improper things. We thank DRA for giving our daughter back to us and allowing her to start over before it was too late.
Thank you DRA
She didn’t change from the “help” she changed because she was scared into submission. I was there for a year an a half an all tha place taught me was how to bullshit better to get home. you think she has changed but I guarantee you she’s doing the same shit jus way more sneaky
This is what happened to him. Go down to the bottom, there are gov links, videos, testimonies etc.
I spent over a year in DRA and I know from experience and evidence that DRA is a 100% brainwashing scam.
Do not send any teen here
I need help. My son was sent to Diamond Ranch Academy without my permission. I want to bring him home. I can not afford a lawyer and the State agencies won’t help. Do you have any suggestions? This is a very well written piece and sums up what I have been feeling since my son left.
I was also. Sent to. DRA for 9 months against my own will, I can honeslty say this school did nothing for me , if. Anything when I got home I was worse, you can’t just send ur child away and have them reformed , it doesn’t work like that, everyone fakes the program and when they get home they are even more screwed up from lack of comunication from the outside world , ur not allowed to useother people in the program as support they have a no touching policy, no huges noone to lean on, no private conversations, the staff don’t care about us and treated us like cattle, I tried to run away and was tackled by a 200 pound women and they took my shoelaces and made me pull a cart around the desert for two weeks . This place is abusive an horrorfying to any teen
I spent 1 year and 29 days at diamond ranch academy in 2007, when I was 14 years old. I was woken up in the middle of the night and pretty much kidnapped by transporters who said if I tried anything they’d ziptie me. The actual dra experience was so traumatic that I don’t like to relive it by discussing specifics, unless asked. My digestive tract was ruined by the “mcdonalds” quality food, I developed severe anxiety and have been dealing with ptsd ever since. I spent years trying to destroy myself afterwards, using heavy drugs daily trying to cope with the after-effects and trauma. 8 years later I’m finally starting to recover both mentally and physically but the nightmares still come to haunt me now and again. Anyways all I have to say is please don’t send your child there if youre thinking about it, and if theyre already there get them out before it destroys them like it did me for a long time. I don’t see myself as a victim, this post is not for pity or compassion, it’s a statement that needs to be made so others know the truth about this place.
This is what happens in that hell hole
http://lauraramargosian.com/?p=1780
As an adult who worked at DRA for a few months, let me calm any parents concerns over this program. Every effort and intention is made by the staff and ownership to keep these students/kids safe from themselves, their bad decisions and to try everything they can with as little physical intervention to help the kids to make better choices. I started as a “parent” over a group of younger boys 12-14 years old. I had some of the worst boys in the program under my care. When the boys acted up, we had protocols to follow to restore them to calm composure as quickly as possible with as little direct contact with them as necessary. I also worked for part of my time there as a head staff and dealt with both boy campuses (the older boys and the younger boys). While many people who work there in a ‘parent’ capacity were college age adults who attended school at Dixie State University, when they came to work, they knew that helping the children became our top priority and the boys got the attention they needed. The program follows a model that reflects real life scenarios. The students/attendees are given rules similar to real life and opportunities equivalent as well to real life. They get citations for bad behavior, same as in real life. They face judges to account for their behaviors, and usually have an equivalent to community service or a fine to pay. When they finally overcome their urges to be that rebellious teen and begin to see the program for what it truly is, their hearts and motives change for the better. If someone leaves this program prematurely, and hasn’t progressed through to graduation, they may exhibit similar bad behaviors that they arrived with. If someone manipulates the system and doesn’t allow the program to help them make the positive changes that this program is designed for, then they may also graduate honorably and then return to their previous behavior. It is only when the child matures enough in his or her own heart and commits themselves to 100% responsibility that they have truly changed themselves for the better. DRA gives any child the best opportunity possible to make the correct changes, get rewarded for doing so, and to graduate honorably…giving them a pattern of positive reinforcement that hopefully will continue when they are transitioned back into society.
I would point out that anyone who doesn’t use their full name, while commenting on any forum about DRA, and bashes this program could very well be an adult from another competing program trying to give bad publicity to DRA because they are trying to steal potential children/teens away from DRA and into their program.
Additionally, if any of these comments are actually teens who have been in the program, and are bashing DRA, then they obviously have not taken 100% responsibility for their own actions and are continuing to frame themselves as the victim. To those I would say, please look deep within yourself. Look at your behavior, your thoughts, and your actions. Are these leading you to happiness? If not, then it’s time to take 100% responsibility of your choices and make the choice that will bring you long term happiness. Drugs, alcohol, frivolous sex, partying and other behaviors that your parents discourage will never bring you that long term happiness. Believe it or not, your parents have likely gone through 90% of the same situations that you have and the direction they give you is ONLY for your best interests. Someday when you’re older, married and have children of your own, you’ll be in the same situation, on the other side. Do you want the kind of rebellious kid that you have been? If not, then make the decision now to be the kind of kid that you want to raise. Lean on that higher power that you were taught about. He will help you. After all, when it’s all said and done, you will only have your own actions to account for, and there will be no excuse accepted as to why you didn’t become who you were meant to become.
Typical program doublespeak.
there still tryna keep there scam up. Devin your a bum
That’s bullshit