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Logically, perhaps, this electronic version of my book could have started with the chapter on Straight�s advertised therapeutic program�the program as it is presented to prospective parents, health officials, law enforcement officials, the press and to the courts. But, because it is electronic and therefore cumbersome to read, I wanted to get to the heart of the problem as directly as soon as possible. The heart of this problem is the large number of former Straight clients who have taken their own lives. And that is what this current chapter is all about. I sincerely hope that before reading the current chapter, the reader has first read chapters one and two because these two chapters build right into chapter three. Chapter one discusses rampant and systematic child abuse so pervasive at Straight that one could only surmise that Straight is going to drive some kids to suicide ideations or attempts. Chapter two documents various cases where many Straight kids did, in fact, carve on their bodies and where many others tried to kill themselves. These kids, board from months or years of doing nothing but sitting in straight-back chairs,�contemplated or attempted suicide to escape being spat upon, sexually abused, beaten, starved, ridiculed, denied sleep. So many kids attempted suicide that in 1983, defending Straight's position on accompanying kids into bathrooms, Straight's national executive director Bill Oliver acknowledged that:

Straight goes to great lengths to make kids feel unwanted, worthless, miserable, desperate.  So it is not surprising that  Straight has to watch these kids wipe themselves on the toilet to make sure they will not try to kill themselves. But what is  the plan once these kids leave?   Suppose a suicidal kid escaped before his sentence was up?  Or what if a parent who had been led to believe that her child should reasonably graduate the program within three months  caught on two years later that her child was still just on 3rd phase  and she was still paying money.  Suppose she withdrew her child before he was Straight certified?  Suppose this kid commits suicide?  Or how about a kid who entered Straight at age 17 and withdrew himself when he became a legal adult at age 18.  What about him.  And don�t forget program graduates.  Straight has certified that he will not use drugs or alcohol, or listen to druggie music.  Suppose this kid had become suicidal at some point in the program.  What was Straight�s plan for releasing these kids who had been driven to the limit by Straight itself.  At a minimum,  if that child has attempted suicide in the program,  should not Straight  at least inform the parent that their child has been suicidal.

This chapter discusses the dismal record of deaths that have plagued the Straights.  First we will look at mental  illnesses and the Straights to see if there is a relationship or pattern between humiliating a child and  frightening a child to the point the child develops mental illness.  And then we will look at Straight and mental illness of clients at a typical  Straight --Straight-Springfield, Virginia.  Then we will look at suicide attempts and body carvings at a typical Straight,  Straight-Springfield.  After that we will discuss the staggering number of suicides and deaths associated with Straight-Springfield.  In the previous chapter we discussed body carvings and suicide attempts by kids at Straights other than Straight-Springfield.  We will conclude this tragic chapter of Straight history by discussing suicides and killings by former clients at the other Straights. 

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Brainwashing in Communist China is an attempt to change the thoughts of the masses of people.  The harshest measures were taken against older Chinese,  set in their ways,  those who were more apt to remember the ways of westerners.  Thus it was so that masses of older Chinese citizens were summarily executed while other large masses were simply sent off to work in labor camps.  But the Chinese also attempted to rehabilitate a third  large mass of its older citizens.  These were sent to political prisons called Seventh of May Academies where the attempt is made to wash old ideas and attitudes from their minds. It is in these political prisons that thought reform is practiced.  As for the young people, they had not been exposed to western ideas as much as their elders, and being young it was felt that less severe methods  could be employed.  So children and teenagers are  controlled and conditioned by attending young Communist clubs where they would denounce their elders the same way DARE kids in America are thought to rat on their own parents.  The young also  participated in peer group confrontations at school.  One particularly successful way to devastate a Communist teenager is to take a kid who has become a leader in getting the group to attack a fellow teenager,  and have the group turn on the leader.  Straight did this all the time.  Let a kid make Fifth phase  only to set him back to First phase for some real or exaggerated rule infraction.  Listen to this account of young Comrade Sun, a student leader from The Thought Revolution by Tung Chi-ping,  (1967), page 108:

Tung's account clearly warns that using extreme psychological means to humiliate a young person may lead to a break with reality.  His account is buttressed by expert opinion of some psychiatrists.  Psychiatrist Peter Breggin runs the Center for the Study of Psychiatry in Washington, DC.  In his book Toxic Psychiatry in writes that people who have done something that they feel bad about turn out to be people who blame themselves.  At the far end these people are obsessive compulsive persons.  And he writes that at the other end are people who have been abused.  These people, he writes, are blamers.  They have a need to put the blame on others for everything thing that happens.  At the far end of this end of the spectrum are the people who lose touch with reality--the schizophrenics,  writes Dr. Breggin.   

Can concentration camp treatment, like Dachau or Straight Springfield, cause schizophrenic-like symptoms in children? Yes says Bruno Bettelheim, Phd Psychology who for several years headed a program for psychologically disturbed children at the University of Chicago. Bruno himself was a survivor of a Nazi concentration camp. He says schizophrenic children and concentration camp inmates, both felt similarly about their lives, "deprived of hope, and totally at the mercy of destructive irrational forces bent on using [them] for their goals." The symptomatic reactions to life in the camps bore a striking resemblance to clinical schizophrenia and included suicidal tendencies, catatonia, or responding to any demand of the SS with no will of one�s own; melancholic depression, infantile behavior, delusions; projections; general loss of memory; shallow, inappropriate emotions; and inability to correctly assess reality.  [Bettelheim, Bruno, Surviving and Other Essays, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, p. 116.]   According anthropologist Willa Appel the same symptoms are found among the victims who have been brainwashed. The common feature among schizophrenic children, concentration camp victims, and people subjected to brainwashing, she writes, is the feeling of being totally overwhelmed. [Appel, Willa, Cults in America, Holt, Rinehart and Winston/New York, � 1983, p. 100.]

These people say what you and I already know.  If you put a kid in a box and severely abuse him.  If you make him feel  different and not part of mainstream,  then there is no telling who might emerge out of that box or what that person might do.  It is simply the calculated destruction of self worth.  But it is in this field that the Straights have an ally in psychiatry.  The Straights can find a majority of psychiatrists to state that regardless of what Straight or anybody else has done to a child,  life events can not drive a person insane.  There is a rationale for that too for if there is  no medical basis for psychosis then  psychiatry would be a profession looking for a reason to be practiced.  There would be nothing a psychiatrist, MD,  could do that a psychologist  could not also do with just a BS degree.  Modern-day psychiatry in the main claims that all psychosis is either hereditary-based or a chemical imbalance, and hence can be treatable by medication.  Psychologists and LCSW can not prescribe drugs. And the Straights have  another powerful argument at their disposal.  Schizophrenia usually first manifests itself in a person's teen years.  

Commenting specifically about Straight, Inc. after a visit to Straight-Springfield,  Professor Barry L. Beyerstein in  "Thought Reform Tactics: The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions" wrote this:

Can Straight cause a kid to be mentally ill?  And if it does not cause mental illness,  can Straight abuse and humiliation setoff episodes of psychotic breaks with reality sooner than they would have happened if a teenage was destined to be schizophrenic anyway?   In a 1991 statement to personnel at Community Improvement, Straight escapee Keith Henson described the plight of a 12 year-old boy who was still in Straight-St Pete whom he described as having mental problems--the kid would crawl around the floor like a puppy dog, he said, and a Straight old comer would spit on him.  In a 1992 notarized statement to Florida's licensing body Health and Rehabilitative Services (HRS), former client Ryan McCormack described his concerns for this child. There were allegations that this kid had sex with his sister. When the child refused to discuss the matter in front of Group  they called him names like faggot, gayfer, Howdy Duddey, 'shit for brains'. One day the child spoke out of turn in Group so they threw him on the floor and rubbed his face in the carpet until he had carpet burns. They slapped him on the head and flicked his ears with their fingers.(21)

One former client who had been in both Straight-Saint Petersburg and Straight-Sarasota recalls a student who defecated in her pants at her host home and smeared the wall with her feces. She tells of another student who masturbated in front of Group.

In 1982 Keith G. received injury to his chin and teeth while at Straight-St Pete. Fred Collins recalls a time when Keith was taken into the boys bathroom where clients sat on him. Fred heard a loud crack and Keith screamed, "You've broken my ribs." A staff member shouted, "Get back on his chest." Some of the phasors did so. Keith bit one of his captors who tried to stuff a sock down his mouth. Keith suffered 7 broken ribs and injury to his arm, and Straight later released him. Keith apparently suffered from psychosis prior to entering Straight, and has apparently been diagnosed as schizophrenic upon leaving--a condition probably aggravated by Straight.(20)

In 1988 Ms. Dorothy Daniels Hobby sued Straight-St Pete for driving her son Michael Daniels insane (he is diagnosed as schizophrenic). His psychiatrist testified that Straight had made him "10 times worse."(22) A professional with Fairfax County Mental Health Services (the county in which Straight-DC formerly operated) has told this writer that the county has treated several former Straight clients. In 2000 Father Doctor V. Miller Newton and his program affiliated psychiatrists settled for $4.5 million with a former client named Rebecca Ehrlich who had claimed she had received psychological damage from treatment at his KIDS' program. (23)

On December 5, 2001 the National Center of Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University published a study which had been initiated because of the 9/11 attack. A finding of this study concluded that, 

The report clearly finds that if you expose a person to trauma,  then that person is 4 to 5 times more likely to abuse mind altering substances than a person who is not traumatized.  And the report further finds that if you place a person who is in recovery from substance abuse or alcohol abuse in a stressful situation,  then that stress will be the "leading" cause to make that  person return to a life of substance abuse.  People like Leighton:

A little girl who was named Kay.  

In 1988 Mrs. H. suspected that her 15 year old daughter was abusing drugs.  She is a woman of modest means but she was determined to get her daughter treatment help.  So she approached Straight-Atlanta and had her girl inducted into Straight.  A few weeks later Mrs. H. was stunned when she was told by program officials the now all-too-familiar tale that her 12 year old, B student daughter Kay was also a drug addict and that unless she consented to sign her in as well she would have to take her older daughter out of the program!  Not knowing how to maintain even one daughter in Straight�s expensive program, Mrs. H. was humbled to learn that an anonymous donor had agreed to pay for both her girls as long as the H. family remained loyal Straight supporters.  And they did.  They went out and solicited money for Straight.  Two years later the older daughter finally graduated from Straight and true to her benefactor�s word, the anonymous donor had paid her full tuition and continued to pay for Kay�s.  Nevertheless,  the H�s actually went financially bankrupt trying to keep up with other Straight expenses.  Six months later Kay had been in Straight for two and a half years, every day and every night, since the age 12 being treated by kids in one of the toughest and most destructive drug rehab programs in the world.  And one might question just how deeply rooted could a 12 year old, B student have gotten into the drug scene without her parents ever even suspecting that she was a drug addict!     

In 1992, after 2 and a half years Kay had finally made it to Phase 5 and the H�s came to realize that Kay was just filling a paid-up billet so they  withdrew her.  By then Kay had become convinced that she was a drug addict.  One day Kay  got a call from a former staff member who invited her to go to a sporting event.  She accepted the offer and at that outing she was crushed when the staff member made amends to her by apologizing for keeping her in Straight for so long, "because,"  she told Kay,  "she [Kay] did not have a drug problem.  It was a financial thing.�   

On July 6, 1996, four years after leaving Straight,  around 10:30  in the evening Kay left her mother�s home to take a walk.  She was only two blocks from her house.  The police report says that Kay walked right into an automobile and was killed instantly.  Mrs. H. doubts that, but had no money to do a proper challenge to the police report.  

Kay had not used drugs prior to Straight but the Columbia 9/11 report is a good predictor that Straight itself would cause her to turn to drugs after Straight which is exactly what she did.  People like Tung Chi-ping, Peter Briggin and  Barry Beyerstein say that if you severally abuse a child,  you may drive him insane.  Did Straight take this little girl who was a good student and drive her to drugs and to insanity.  Is she dead because of Straight? 

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(This section is on suicide attempts and suicide completions by students and alumni from Straight's infamous treatment camp in Springfield, Virginia.  If you want to get a better glance at just how obscene this facility was,  click here.)  

At Straight-Springfield in Fairfax County, Virginia client 90025 said she was spat upon, locked in a closet, had her shoulder dislocated and was raped with a curling iron by old comer girls for not writing her Moral Inventory. Later she slit her wrists.⁽⁸⁾ Straight - Springfield  client # 89016 made a suicide attempt in August  1988 but there is no record that a psychiatrist was informed. On Mar 9, 1989 Straight notes state "her needs could be better met in another facility." On March 16 she attempted suicide again by cutting her wrists and an old comer was assigned to watch her. Again no psychiatrist was informed. She was finally released on April 14, 1989.⁽⁹⁾  In January 1989, Straight-Springfield client # 89028, who claims he had been restrained and spat upon, tried to hang himself. A psychiatrist prescribed Desipramine, but there was no follow-up. In February # 89028 told a fellow client he didn't feel like living anymore, and cut his wrists requiring 7 stitches.  

Thirteen year-old Chuck was released from Straight-Springfield after 6 months of what he calls a "devastating experience" after counselors decided drugs was not his primary problem. Chuck has attempted to cut his wrists, though it is not known if this was before, during or after his Straight experience.⁽¹⁴⁾  Fred Collins, Jr., Ph.D., who was awarded $220,000 for false imprisonment by Straight, says he had suicidal thoughts when he was in Straight.⁽¹⁹⁾ 

Terrae L. was in Straight-Springfield.  She recalls two suicide attempts by girls in Straight.  One girl had sliced her wrist in a host home.  Terrae says that she and the other girls were made to wipe up her blood.  The girl was sent to the emergency room, and her mother received a bill from the hospital,  but the mother was never told what the bill was for.   In a site visit by Virginia authorities to Straight-Springfield client # 3 reported that after making a suicidal gesture she was stood before Group which shouted to her that she was "sick" and mockingly sang the "Tasty Cake" song to her. Client # 2 reported being sung "The Tasty Cake" song and put on "suicide watch" by her peers after her suicide gesture.[h]  No doctor was called. Client's 1, 3, 5, and 11 reported that newcomers are often placed on suicide watch as a consequence to deprive them of sleep.⁽¹⁵⁾  In a Virginia Department of Mental Health  letter on June 13, 1989 to Mr. Dare, Straight's attorney, Mr. Dare was informed that inspector Joni Baldwin had noticed scratches and scars on children to support that incidents of children carving on themselves was occurring and that from her observations staff was not situated where they could spot this activity.

Mark F. is a successful auto dealer in Virginia.  But things were not always so rosy for him.  He got out of  Straight-Springfield around 1991.  Two years later he says he was feeling very despondent and on the verge of suicide.  Here's what he wrote me (I have subsequently met this man.): 

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According to Totally Awesome Health by Linda Meeks and Philip Heit [Meeks Heit Publishing Co. c. 1999, p. 287]:

Janice and Nancy [not their real names] were two American teenagers who did not do drugs or alcohol.  The 9/11 study would indicate that if you placed them in Straight  then you would greatly increase the likelihood of them turning to drugs.   Meeks and Heit would add that if one of them were to commit suicide,  alcohol would probably be involved.  Janice and Nancy were in Straight-Springfield,  at the same time.  The author remembers them and has spoken to both women.  

Janice  remembers feeling not very popular in the eight grade. Desperate for friends and acceptance she started dressing provocatively. She cursed her parents and trashed the principal's office. Janice remembers a lot of arguing between her parents. She ran away from home. Her parents suspected she was on drugs.  The truth is she  had once taken eight No Dose,  and on another occasion she had sipped a beer to be cool, but had poured it out when no one was looking. She had hated the taste. Janice had growing-up problems like teenage girls have always had since the dawn of time,  but drug use was not among them. Yet at age 13 she found herself in Straight-Springfield, one of the toughest juvenile drug rehab programs in the country  where she was treated for 22 months for a problem she did not have. Her intake drug test had been negative. 

Janice was a plum for Straight because her dad is a dentist,  but she presented a problem for Straight because she would not confess to being a drug addict.   So she was assigned to a special "strong" host home until she would admit that she was a drug addict. At this home she was placed on a "no extras" consequence. While the host family and her fellow students there ate well, while her mom and dad paid out $30,0000 and opened up their home as a boarding house for other Straight kids, Janice was made to eat peanut butter sandwiches and drink water on the floor with the dog. She was not even allowed jelly for her sandwich or ice for her water as they were "extras" she did not deserve. The table eating folk often flaunted their meals at her, and once Janice's old comer gave Janice her pizza. "I thought she was "soo" nice for doing that?!?!", recalls Janice.  She had to endure 30 second cold showers and was made to wear humiliating cloths and 20 barrettes in her hair to work on her humility. When one of her old comers accidentally told her that her grandfather had died, Janice had become very shaken and upset, but she was not allowed to discuss the death with her parents. Later she found out that her own mother was not allowed to visit her grandfather on his death bed to say goodbye because she had to give Janice Mike Talk. 

One week Janice was assigned out from the "strong" host home. In the new home she received "sleep" consequence where she was allowed 3 hours of sleep per night in 15 minute increments. Alternately through the night was was screamed at by old comers for 15 minutes and then allowed to sleep for 15 minutes. The three old comers took shifts screaming at her so they could get some sleep.  Janice feels the sleep deprivation is what finally "broke" her. By the time she got out of Straight 22 months after she had entered she was convinced she had a drug problem. She was able to get her Straight file and read that staff thought she had an emotional problem but that drug usage was not suspected. So for three months Janice started using drugs--pot, LSD, Alcohol and PCP. But Janice pulled through this period of her life too and is doing fine today.  She has a job and is going to school  but the future has not proven to be so fortuitous for Nancy. 

Nancy was 16 when she was placed in Straight-Springfield alongside Janice.  Nancy had exhibited what her mother perceived to be anti-social behavior. Her mother had taken her to a psychologist who could not find the nature of Nancy's problems. Maybe she's using drugs he had told her mother at one point.  Alarmed by this possibility, Nancy's mother took her to Straight, having heard of the great success rates Straight was claiming. But Straight had the same problem with Nancy that it had had with Janice. Straight had been unable to get Nancy to admit that she had ever used illegal drugs--at all. The state of Virginia requires juvenile drug rehabilitation programs to have at a minimum a  consulting psychiatrist.  This psychiatrist is required to conduct an intake interview.   There might be a dual diagnosis, for example. A kid might be an abuser of drugs, but he might also be psychotic or schizophrenic. After interviewing Nancy on October 27, 1989, Straight's consulting psychiatrist Dr. Ross Silverstein concluded in his written assessment, "I found it very difficult to assess the extent of ______'s  problem with drugs and alcohol".  He recommended that Straight:  " . . . continue to evaluate her to get more evidence to determine whether or not she needs to be at Straight. Her current reports of drug use, in my opinion, would not warrant ongoing intensive treatment but we should continue to evaluate her. I would have Dr [Peter] Cohen also evaluate her for a second opinion concerning possible use of anti-depressant medication . . ."

According to a report by the Virginia Department of Mental Health, Straight's records do not contain documentation to substantiate that Dr. Cohen did complete a second opinion as recommended by Dr. Silverstein. Nancy's record does not show that Straight continued to evaluate her by gathering evidence to support whether her placement at Straight was appropriate to meet her needs, as recommended by Dr. Silverstein. Dr. Silverstein had expressed doubts as to whether Nancy  needed intensive treatment. But she got it anyway! After a month Straight could not break her. They couldn't get her to admit that she was a drug addict. Finally Straight had had it with Nancy and on November 11, 1989 A. N., then an adult counselor at Straight, now a juvenile substance abuse counselor for the City of Fairfax, Virginia, selected six kids to accompany himself and Nancy into intake room #2. Later A. N. wrote in his follow-up report that while Nancy was being confronted, she started fighting and so A. N. and the six boys and girls had to defend themselves by restraining her. A. N. reported that several people, including himself, had been scratched. A Dr. Nejad noted on November 29, 1989 that X-rays of Nancy's hand showed "a condylar fracture with very minimal displacement". A Fairfax Hospital Emergency Room note of November 26, 1989  by Dr. Kathryn Kenders states "fracture phalanx, . . . middle or proximal". Both notes indicate that restraint was implemented with unnecessary roughness.  They had pulled Nancy's finger back too far, thus breaking it.  Just the year before a 19 year-old male student at Straight-Springfield had his finger placed in a cast becasue, he reported to authorities,  they had bent it back till it nearly touched his wrist.  

In a court deposition Nancy stated that she was taken into the intake room because she refused to admit to having used drugs. Once inside the room the seven people surrounded her and screamed obscenities at her and spat on her. This is called the Bomb Squad in Straight. They screamed that she was fat and ugly, she alleges, and not pretty like her sister. A. N. stood there, she testified, and watched as they bent her finger back. And back. And back until it touched her arm. That's when it snapped!  Imagine being self conscious about your weight and having people scream at you that you're fat and ugly, and not pretty like your sister as they break your finger!  How long would it take for the shock of such an experience to wear off? A week? Two months? Ten years? A Lifetime?  I spoke with Nancy in 1993. She was an attractive young lady,  sensitive and well mannered,  she was  conservatively dressed.

Ten years after "blowing" Nancy away, on October 15, 2000 the Richmond, Virginia Police found her body outside her apartment. She had plummeted, mysteriously, from her fourth floor apartment window being killed instantly. Nancy had probably known Glen Steepleton at Straight-Springfield.  Strangely she mysteriously died less than a month after Glen.  The detective investigating her death told me that she must have had some penchant for pain. He said that he himself has a small tattoo on his leg and that it hurt like hell getting it. But this girl, he had said, had tattoos over much of her body! I think she had this thing for pain, he told me.  Straight had criminally inflicted Nancy with unimaginable physical pain in trying to extort a confession.  Had Nancy, psychologically,  turned to a mechanism to give her physical pain.  Straight had told her that her body was fat and ugly.  When Nancy fell she had no clothes on.  Why?   The Columbia 9/11 report would predict that Nancy would turn to alcohol or drugs because she had been  traumatized in a very vicious and violent manner at Straight,  and Meeks and Heit would predict that Nancy would probably have been drinking if she had taken her own life.  The autopsy report revealed that Nancy was intoxicated.  The official coroner's report concluded accident.  One more thing.  On Nancy's wrist,  above her index finger,  was a lone tattoo.  It reads DISCIPLINE!    

In late September of 1985 two friends at Robinson High School hung themselves within 5 days of each other. The first boy hung himself from a tree in his yard. The other hung himself in a utility shed at his home. The two boys  were Gregg Hughes and Jon Guyton. Gregg Hughes had been in Straight- Springfield. Now an unsubstantiated but reliable source has informed this writer that Jon Guyton had probably also been in Straight-Springfield.

Steve Matthews was in Straight-Springfield from 1982 to 1985.  In three years of the treatment he made 3rd Phase once--for 2 days!   Steve was on 1st Phase 33 out of 36 months.  According to his sister Kelley,  Group made an example out of her handsome brother,  often.  Straight was scared to hold Steve against his will when he turned 18 in 1985 (Straight had just been forced by a federal court in Alexandria, Virginia to pay Fred Collin's $220,000 for falsely imprisoning that 18 year-old),  so Steve just walked out the door the day he turned 18.  Nine months later he jumped to his death form a motel window.  

And Steve Matthews was not the only former student of Straight-Springfield to commit suicide in 1986.  Chris Weiss [left] had been in Straight-St Pete before being transferred up to Straight - Springfield.  Chris' pediatrician has stated that Chris did not have a drug problem.  His father feels that Chris did not have a drug problem.  Chris' father removed Chris from the program after a year of treatment.   In March 1986 Chris Weiss took a gun and shot himself dead.⁽²⁵⁾  

Duane Rholfs (left) and Chris Kelly, two seniors at George Marshall High School in Fairfax County, Virginia committed suicide together on April 17, 1987.  Rholfs had been a student in Straight - Springfield.

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Chris Poole entered Straight-Springfield on Thursday February 7,1985. The next day an event happened that he will never forget. He writes:

"On Friday February 8,1985 I experienced my first Straight Friday Night Open Meeting and "Review." "Review" is a particular rap at Straight that was held every Monday and Friday night where Straight kids AKA Straight clients are stood up in front of a large group of people and yelled at, mocked, confronted, verbally assaulted and verbally abused endlessly by fellow kids and staff members for having committed real or imagined violations of the endless set of Straight Rules. During that Friday Night Review oldcomer Duane Rholfs was stood up and confronted severely by several people for [he had been accused of] having had sex at his high school inside the high school with a female high school student. I believe he was asked to go into details about the entire incident. He was ridiculed, humiliated, confronted and yelled at by many fellow clients and staff for what he did. The guys side ripped him apart verbally and than Staff marched him over to the girls side where he was once again ridiculed, humiliated, confronted by the girls side in front of the entire girls side. One girl yelled at him in Grandstanding fashion by saying she hoped the girl he had sex with had Herpes and then everyone in Group started laughing. Duane Rholfs was crying his eyes out the entire time .He was completely upset and devastated by the unrelenting abuse they were inflicting upon him. They just chewed him apart like wild flesh eating piranhas. The guys side was relentless by having many people confront him one after the other and then the girls side treated him the exact same way. After the girls side was finished with Duane the Staff marched him back over to the Guys side where he was started over to Day 1 Newcomer status. It was awful the hell they put him through. He must have had at least 10 to 15 or more people yelling at him that night as well as the other awful emotions he was feeling and experiencing. All this hell they put him through as well as the discouragement and other negative feelings of having been started over after he put in all that time and effort to reach oldcomer status. They embarrassed the hell out of him in front of both guys and girls review raps that night which totals up to between 60 to 100 people. The total amount of time Duane was yelled at in both reviews combined was 30 minutes or more. At Straight when oldcomers are started over it is common for them to be taken out of Group and strip searched in the bathroom. While I don't know for a fact if this was done with Duane I believe it certainly is a strong possibility." 

According to Duane's brother,  Duane had been in Straight 18 months, when, on fifth phase, somebody reported him for having a relationship with a girl,  or for wanting to have a relationship with a girl.   The next day,  after being set back, he says his mom and dad  told Duane  they thought he did not need Straight any more and withdrew him from the program.  They had had to take out a second mortgage on their home to pay Straight.  Duane's brother says that at one point Straight had told his mother that his dad was not good for the program.   Chris can certainly understand what  happened next because he feels he himself was suffering from post stress traumatic syndrome  when he finally got out of Straight. He was so depressed from Straight-induced depression that in 1988 he tried to commit suicide by taking some of his grandfather's "green" pills.  Later he found out that they were just diet pills.  In 1990 he tried to kill himself by holding his breath!  He laughs about that today.  

On April 17,  1987, only eighteen months after the Hughes/Guyton double suicide,  Fairfax County was riveted once again, this time when two seniors at George Marshall High School drove up to Pennsylvania, parked their car and ran a hose from the tailpipe back into the cab and committed suicide. The two seniors were Duane Rholfs and Chris Kelly.⁽²⁶⁾  Next day a 19 year-old woman named Joon Byun, a recent graduate of George Marshall, was killed in an automobile accident in Vienna, Virginia. Did she know either Duane Rholfs or Chris Kelly?  Disturbingly, Duane Rholfs and Gregg Hughes may not be the only former Straight-clients linked to cluster suicides.�

Mathew W. Hunter from Pennsville, New Jersey was in Straight-Springfield in the 1984 - 1985 timeframe. He committed suicide, in Pennsville, on January 21, 1988. This suicide is under investigation by the Oakton Institute. 

Christine  Stottlemeyer had been in Straight-Springfield in the 1980s. Both she and her boyfriend had graduated from Straight-Springfield and she had become a counselor there. Her boyfriend took a job with Father Doctor Miller Newton at Kids of Bergen County but when he got to New Jersey Dr. Newton made her boyfriend start over at phase I again, before he could get the job. Missing her boyfriend Christine went up to Kids of Bergen County for treatment too. Around 1995 Kristen Sottlemeyer jumped out of her hospital window and killing herself..  The photo shows her at a beach party with friends.

The son of Simone D. (a former client in Straight - Springfield) was murdered in a drug deal gone bad.

There's  a good chance Kevin Yriondo was in Straight-Springfield  with Duane Rholfs, Gregg Hughes,  Christine Sottlemeyer,  Chris Weiss and Steve Matthews.  He was only in for a week in 1984,  but that was enough to make him a life-long fighter to free people from abusive 12 Step programs.  Kevin moved to Florida in 1992  and became a copy editor for a newspaper.  He used to post to our discussion forum under the name Kevin (you might have seen him on the net as SURIYBIRD).  Here's some excerpts from his posts:

• In just one week there I had some horrible experiences, like being screamed at in front of 120 people for 6 hours -- people who spit in my face, insulted me, etc. I broke the nose of one counselor (a tall guy) . . . 
• I remember the hymns, the rituals, the swarming of hands in the air, the people who were restrained to the point they could barely inhale air, the door alarms at night, the beds pushed against the door to prevent escape, the bars on the windows, and the extreme psychological abuse. . . I remember them taking my food (a taco shell and a banana) because I "ate like a 'druggie'" -- I am a vegetarian and that's all they served that I could eat!
• I am NOT violent, but I was fighting for my mind, as I'd expect anyone would do. I saw people admitted on the same day break under the stress. . . 

Kevin Yriondo committed suicide on July 9, 2000.

The Straights have a terrible reputation for discounting pleas for help when kids say they feel suicidal. The Straights have frequently been cited for calling this "attention getting behavior." Many kids have cut their wrists at Straight and Straight has often taken the absurd therapeutic position that the child is not really trying to kill herself but rather just trying to be manipulative in order to get attention! The Straights have mocked, sung teasing songs to and even had the entire Group to "blow away" kids who have attempted suicide while in the program.

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Suing Parents and The Paul Riffle Story. The Straights have a long history of suing the parents of its students. A search of Pinellas County, Florida court records by a reporter for the Saint Petersburg Times around 1991 found that Straight had sued at least 80 families in the last 10 months alone. Few people ever actually graduated from Straight. Straight made parents sign a contract that no matter what happened in there they would not sue. Most parents eventually woke up to the fact that their child was not going to graduate in 3 months or six months, or they caught on that Straight was abusing their child, or they realized that Straight was pressuring them to enter their other kids who did not have a drug problem, or their child escaped, or they simply refused to put up with the total demands Straight placed upon their own lives to treat them for their child's illness. Straight knew this and made the parents sign a contract that the bulk of the money was due, up-front upon admissions and if you withdrew your child early they kept the money. Richard and Susan Ferris were among the 80 families sued by Straight - Saint Petersburg in one 10 month period. Straight sued them for $1,089. Mrs. Ferris says that her son had been seduced by his host mother so she refused to pay, but later settled with Straight anyway just to make them go away. Straight sued Patricia Neumann of Lake Alfred but Mrs. Neumann filed a court document stating that she had been coerced by Straight and that the coercion included being told her son would "die without Straight." Robert and Veronica McCallion of St. Petersburg wrote in a court document that Straight was "unprincipaled" and "had no intention of living up to their promise of treatment and rehabilitation" Darlene Licate of Spring Hill said her daughter had been stripped-searched and verbally abused. "I don't pay for abuse," she said.

Growing Together is a Sembler-based synanon in Lake Worth, Florida. Here are some Florida parents they have sued:

• Charles A. Parnell of Palm Beach Gardens
• Janet Knauss of West Palm Beach
• Ellie Madison of Fort Lauderdale
• Janice McIntyre of Singer Island
• Michael and Janice Peterson of Palm Beach Gardens
• Janette Thorin of Lake Worth

Straight - Springfield, Virginia sued too. Here are some defendants and the judgments Fairfax County judges awarded to Straight:

• Howard Shawell of Pottstown, PA ordered to pay $10,527.42
• Sandra Woodward of Pikesville, MD ordered to pay $9,268.55
• Kathleen Riffle of Burtonsville, MD ordered to pay $16,120.22
• Robert and Glenita Jones of Fort Washington, MD sued for $8,669.06
• Charles and Mary Kurtinitis of Bowie, MD ordered to pay $7,424.52
• Susan Silk of Wilmington, DE ordered to pay $12,521.05
• Marilyn Jane Carson of Baltimore, MD
• Donald Rao of Washington, DC sued for $7355.00
• Stella Moore
• Sandra Smith case L107171
• Charles Tolbert of Fairfax, Virginia,
• Alvin and Donna Sprague
• Calvin and Elmire Johnson
• Rosalyn Walker
• Charles Howard

And there are many others. Interestingly Fairfax Food Services & Caterers (In Step Corporation) was one that sued Straight. They were awarded $17,177.72 for food they had supplied plus interest, but Straight avoided collections until the judgment was eventually "discontinued and stricken" by the Fairfax County Courts.

Look at Charles Tolbert one of those who was sued by Straight. I personally witnessed Charles Tolbert at a Friday night Mic Talk trying to address his son but was repeatedly interrupted, corrected and ridiculed by the 16 year old psychiatric synamaster on how to address his own son across the picket line. Chuck Tolbert was so humiliated that left compound. His common-law wife of over 10 years was forbidden from the camp grounds because she was living in sin. Charles Tolbert is a truly fine man and I invited him over to diner one night. But even though he had been cleared to be a Straight parent with a boy and a girl in the program, they denied my request to have him over because they had character issues with him. Eventually they broke his son's arm but did not let him see a doctor until the next day (click on Virginia Department of Mental Health's inspection findings on Mr. Tolbert's son # 90010). And so he took both his kids out. Would you pay them? Straight sued him for their money!

Straight's main selling point is that your child will die without Straight. But another big recruitment item is telling a a parent that: Psychiatrists can't relate to druggie kids, only a druggie kid in recovery can relate to another druggie kid. They will tell parents that their child will just get more drugs in a psychiatric hospital, and tell them that a kid's attitudes can't be changed in just 30 days, anyway. So you can pay a psychiatric hospital $35,000 for 30 days of baby-sitting, they say, or you can go into Straight and get several months of attitude adjustment for a fraction of the cost! What they don't tell you until you sign the papers is that you are expected to devote all your time to the program, that you are also sick because drug addiction is a total family illness, that you must bring food for resale, that a hat is passed for additional donations, that you must sale fund raising items for them, that there are hidden costs you were never informed about, that the total amount is due immediately, that if you withdraw next day you forfeit all your money, and that regardless what happens in there you will not sue. Somehow under all that persuasion and in a state of panic and haste to save their child's life it doesn't register with an unsuspecting parent that though a psychiatric stay may indeed be an outrageous $35,000, that amount is based on your health provider's coverage. The parent's out-of-pocket expense will only be about $2,000. But with hidden costs and because Straight' methods are not normally recognized as bona-fide by health insurance providers, as a Straight parent you might be paying $20,000 to $40,000 out-of pocket! So it shouldn't surprise you that when Straight - Saint Petersburg sued a woman from Gainesville, Florida for $14,251 for services rendered to the woman's daughter, that the mother claimed she went bankrupt.^(28.1) Nor should it surprise you to know that when Straight - Springfield sued Marilyn Jane Carson of Baltimore, MD she too declared bankruptcy. And then there's Kathleen Riffle of Burtonsville, MD. Like Joyce Tobias and so many others Kathleen Riffle put both her boys into Straight. They were twins. Being a single mom Ms. Riffle struggled to pay for over $14,000 Straight claimed she owed them after her boy Paul escaped. Paul Riffle took a gun and shot himself dead. But that was no concern of Straight. Straight wanted its money and started sending Ms. Riffle a series of very threatening and abusive letters.⁽²⁷⁾ Ultimately Straight got a Fairfax County judge to get them a judgment against Ms. Riffle for $16,120.22. I have lost contact with Mrs. Riffle and do not have copies of those threatening letters but I do have some threatening letters from that time period that Linda Howard, a Virginia resident, received to give you an idea of what Straight continued to put Ms. Riffle through. Mrs. Howard received two threatening form letters from a Mike Bott in November 1991, plus two letters from him and one from a Pamela Watson. Click on the Bott letter #1 and the Bott letter #2. When a Fairfax County judge ordered Mrs. Riffle to pay Straight $16,120.22, Mrs. Riffle told this writer that she had to considered bankruptcy. [Incidentally, Straight is not the only cult that has been accused of sending threatening letters to its debtors. Read this accounting from the scandal of scientology by Paulette Cooper describing a collection letter by a Scientology minister.]

Well, Russ, Johns Hopkins does include a third type of stuttering--psychogenic which they define as ". . . stuttering . . . believed to originate in the mind in the area of the brain that directs thought and reasoning. This type of stuttering may occur in people with mental illness or who have experienced mental stress or anguish. However, although stuttering may cause emotional problems, it is not believed to [be] the result of emotional problems." 

Dylan was in Straight-Springfield.  Mark Fuller recalls that when Dylan entered Straight he seemed like any other kid in the program. But something happened to him in there. Dylan became very withdrawn and refused to participate. Mark remembers when they dug out Dylan's deepest, darkest secret from him. They stood him on a stool and everyone started laughing at him and taunting him about it. They sang the Tasty Cake song to him and simply humiliated him. Dylan had been a new comer in this writer's home. He was a sweet kid, but very withdrawn. I remember that I made Dylan in charge of the kitchen. When old comers asked for an additional helping I told them to ask Dylan--"he's in charge of the kitchen." "Dad," they would say, "we can't do that, Dylan is just a new comer." But they asked him and Dylan would smile and say "OK." Dylan was always sketching so I bought him an artist sketch pad, but program officials took it away saying he needed to concentrate on his addiction. They used to send Dylan to the special extension apartment down the street from the main camp where spit therapy was administered in a closet in the evening. The first thing I noticed about Dylan was that he had an awful stutter. Mark Fuller remembers Dylan did not stutter when he entered Straight. Dylan is now insane--schizophrenic.

The first thing I noticed about Bill Fager when we took him out of Straight was that he had developed a stutter and somehow I immediately correlated this with Dylan. Bill had never been a good student. Bill had attended private schools all the way through starting with Montessori when he was only three--except when he attended second grade in a public school. In 1986 we moved near Washington, DC because of a job promotion. We lived way out in the country on a ten acre ranch. Bill went to public school there and played junior varsity football and was in the band. He even tied for second place in his middle school science project. He had built a circuit with a diode in it to demonstrate a flashing light as alternating current cycled through it, stepped down by a toy train transformer. But still  Bill was not a good student,  so we moved closer in to town.

He was in his third new school in as many years, had no friends and got in with the wrong crowd. We suspected he was using drugs and took him to Straight on the recommendation of his guidance counselor. She had told us that Straight was a Marine Corps-like, character building program for the tougher cases. So we went to Straight to check it out and they told us we should not have told Bill about them. The first thing all the other places had asked us was whether we had health insurance.  Not Straight. They seemed genuinely concerned about Bill and the pain and fear my wife and I were feeling. Bill ran away after this introduction to Straight.

I used to get a call weekly from a Straight recruiter I'll call Alice. "What's he doing now?," she would ask. "What are you going to do?" "It's a matter of time?"  I would answer that I have to evaluate his true experience with drugs and she would say he's an addict. I would say I have to plan for his schooling. She would say he will get schooling here. I would say I have to make arrangements for money. She would say how can you worry about money at a time like this. "He's in danger," she would say, "besides, we will work with you on the money"  And every week she would tell me,  "he's going to die you know!" She would have tears streaming down my face. She was so concerned and caring. She made me feel so guilty and scared. Let me be perfectly clear about this. Alice was absolutley convinced she was saving kids from themselves. Two years after we left the cult I learned that Alice had been calling my wife weekly at her office too giving her the same spiel that she had given me. 

When we finally put Bill in Straight they had me sign so many papers I gave up reading what I was signing. Last stop was a lady named Pat the cashier. She demanded $7,500 cash (plus $500 a month thereafter). When I told her I didn't have that kind of money, she punched the the paper rudely on the countertop making a loud thumping sound. "See this, you just agreed to pay us $7,500.  Where is it?"   I told her that I thought Straight would work with us on the money, but she would have no part of that.  "Do you have a rich relative? Can you borrow against your life insurance? Take out a second mortgage? How much can you give us right now?," she asked. Straight became like a church to us. All our time was spent with Straight.  We sang childish songs and took turns standing one another up at bi-weekly fellowship meetings alternately praising and criticizing each other,  and hugging one another.  There was an endless session of fundraising activities. 

They used to spit on Bill in one of the special extension apartments known as The Wall which was down the street from the main camp.  One night they pulled his finger back so far he started crying that if they didn't stop they would break it. While doing this they repeatedly asked Bill questions like whether he had ever had sex with his mother or father or sister. The spit dried on Bill's face and he slept in it and developed impetigo.

There was this man in Group who had sexually molested a new comer and had been set back to recover from his homosexuality. He did,  and made old comer status again.  But once again he sexually abused a new comer. Group was merciless on the old comer. Bill started developing a bizarre theory that the FBI was in cahoots with Straight. That they had implanted cameras and tape recorders in the walls. That they were keeping computer data files on potential child molesters so that when the Cold War was over and they needed a mission to justify their jobs, they would declare a war on child molesters. They say Bill was passive in Straight and withdrawn like Dylan.  One of his old comers remembers him being depressed.  But one day Bill did stand up.  He jumped up and screamed,  "you guys are fucking nuts," and started giving them the finger with each hand.  He was subdued by a crowd who suspended him horizontally as they carried him down the aisle to the rear as on-lookers spat in his face in a scene, reminiscent to Bill,  like something out of  The Exorcist.    He was sat in the back with human spit dripping down his face when the same adult counselor who had supervised the breaking of Nancy's finger came out of a doorway to ask him if he was going to settle down though he did not offer to let him wipe the globs off his face.  In Bill's distorted thinking the  counselor had observed the entire  episode through cameras and microphones hidden in the walls and provided by the FBI. 

Straight took all our time and energy, and tried to convince my daughter she needed Straight's special  treatment too. Before our devastating experience was over, Straight had convinced my wife of 23 years to leave me because I was not good for the program. When we took Bill out of the cult after only four months of isolation, he had developed a very, noticeable stutter. And that's when I thought of Dylan. Bill would pick fists fights with me after Straight by jabbing me in the ribs with outstretched fingers the way he had been taught in Straight--by then little Billy was weighing 300 pounds.  And Bill had developed another problem in Straight,  a problem of thought,  but I'll leave that to him.  Anyway, related life experiences subsequent to Straight led to a total break with reality. He heard voices coming from the walls and saw deathly images in his head. One day he burned himself with a soldering iron. His therapist said he was trying to determine if he was real. His therapist and one of his psychiatrists said that he may have been borderline schizophrenic but Straight pushed him over the edge. Another time Bill sliced his wrists, but the cuts were shallow.  He told his mother he was a Christian and could not kill himself.  On another episode Bill's sister found  him on the edge of a cliff;  we think he was preparing to jump.  In spite of his increasing paranoia Bill went back to high school and graduated insisting he take Algebra to make his dad proud of him.  Bill plays drums and taught himself the piano.  He even copyrighted a song that he wrote before he lost touch with reality.

Bill sued Straight for driving him insane and for abusing him. Straight was able to prevail in court convincing the jury that life experiences can not make a person schizophrenic. Straight had former drug czar Dr. Robert DuPont as an expert witness testifying in Straight's behalf. Bill tried to bring in a barrage of others who had also been abused, but here Straight is wise. Since Bill was not allowed to look left or right, he could not always say who was being harmed next to him or who was getting it in the bathroom, and the same for others who could witness Bill's abuse. Thus unless he or they could state that they saw Bill being abused or Bill saw them being abused, they could not be called as witnesses. Three old comers could beat 200 clients before The Wall, but if one client at a time was beaten in the closet with the door shut, then Straight could always have three witnesses against one in a criminal court, and the 200 abused clients could not even testify in a civil suit because the plaintiff could not see beyond the door, nor could the potential witnesses. Bill lost his civil suit against Straight. The jury seemed to say, "we don't believe Straight did these horrible things to this young man; but even if they did, he's a fucking drug addict so who cares what happened to him!" 

We tried so hard to keep Bill from using drugs, but now he takes a handful of medically, accepted drugs twice daily just to be able to make it through the day. Bill will be hopelessly insane for the rest of his life.