Though Ms. Allred's office has spent months soliciting a cash settlement, we were unaware that a suit would be filed. Staff members would jump on you, said Schrag. Circle of Hope Girls Ranch near Humansville . Jim Clemensen, a former California Highway Patrol officer, initially decided to open a group home in Stockton, California, before setting up Agap on an old Air Force base in Othello, Washington. The charges come after the Missouri State Highway Patrol investigated allegations of abuse at the boarding school. But under Missouri law, it was up to Cedar County prosecutor Ty Gaither to file charges. Many Stockton residents consider Agap a mark of honor. We are gathered here, former students,. For so long, nobody cared.. They say theyre still haunted by nightmares, hypervigilance, and other symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. 60% of the children in our county are being placed outside of our county due to the lack of foster homes in our community. 79 were here. TOUGH-LOVE SCHOOLS CAN BE traced back to the 1950s, when a secular group called Synanon pioneered an approach to curing heroin addiction with isolation, humiliation, and sleep deprivation. Agape Ranch is dedicated to making a difference within their community and building capacity within the team. The Kansas City Star ran a series of exposs detailing shocking allegations first about Circle of Hope, then Agap. He says he was once ordered to perform 4,500 pushups for cussing and told if I didnt get it done, I couldnt eat my next meal. (Though Breshears says he couldnt do it, Agap denies ever denying a student a meal.) At a hearing in the Missouri Legislature on Wednesday, a department official said it has been difficult to substantiate abuse allegations at religious boarding schools due to "a culture of restricted access.". He grabbed the bat, charged toward the front of the cafeteria, and shattered a plate-glass window. Until 2017, Alabamas Religious Freedom Amendment shielded boarding schools such as the Restoration Youth Academy and its sister facility, the Saving Youth Foundation, from government oversight. Netflixs Outer Banks Buries Itself in Ridiculous Season 3 Colton Shrag, age 16 on a home visit from Agap in 2008. One student, identified only by his initials, describes being forced to run outside while a staffer tailed him in a four-wheeler with a stick attached to the front, threatening to ram anyone who wasnt moving fast enough. We are the best rehab . It is one of the 2 times he saw his family between 2006 and 2010. The school states on its website that its staff are trained in proper restraining tactics, which are only used if a child is a threat to others and last for just a few minutes. The video was posted Sunday by Robert Bucklin, who says he survived physical and sexual abuse at Agape Boarding School near Stockton. Relevance: This course is designed for master's level counselors, addiction professionals, and nurses who have direct client contact. After being charged with more than 100 felonies last year linked to allegations of child sex abuse, physical abuse, endangerment and neglect, the owners of a now-defunct Missouri girls ranch . Meanwhile, the husband-and-wife founders of Circle of Hope, Boyd and Stephanie Householder, face a combined 99 charges that include child abuse and neglect, sex crimes and other counts. Since it claims to be a Christian organization, is not regulated by the state because of a religious exemption. There, according to Bindley, he was put to work painting, roofing, and helping to dismantle a web of lead pipes covered in asbestos, which he was told to carry to the top of a hill and throw into a pit used to burn garbage. On cue, at least two others started beating up an unsuspecting student to create a distraction. The school's focus now is "on getting the boys who remain in the program safely transitioned to their parents or to foster care, other group homes or residential programs," its former director, Bryan Clemensen, said in a statement. In the ensuing chaos, a third pulled the fire alarm. Hilton tweeted to Missouri's attorney general and governor on June 21. Every year, Agape Ranch hosts our Adoption Connection event to help children in foster care find their forever home. Published: Mar. Agape Ranch will establish a safe environment of 24 homes where foster children can receive the support they need in order to mature in all aspects of their lives. People had reported Circle of Hope at least 19 times since it opened to three sheriffs departments, state child welfare and education officials, the highway patrol, and the state attorney generals office, according to interviews and records obtained by NBC News. Francis lied, he said, because Robert Graves a Cedar County sheriffs deputy who is on the board of Agaps church and has worked at the school was present for the interview. Seth Duncan was charged with five counts of third . Jan. 18, 2023. They noted that DSS had confirmed a case of child abuse and added the name of the Agap staffer responsible to the Child Abuse and Neglect Central Registry, prohibiting him from working at a residential facility. For secular youth facilities regulated by Missouris social services department, as well as those that have contracts with the state, social welfare agents conduct inspections at least twice a year to review staff training, check compliance with fire and health codes, and make sure employees have background checks and that children get proper medical attention. February 28, 2023. Agape Boarding school has had its share of abuse allegations over the years. He says one told local police that he had escaped from a Nazi camp.. South Carolina is a possibility; it still does not require religious schools to register with the state. Children as young as four-years-old may have had up to five foster . The criminal division of the EPA investigated and charged Jim Clemensen for improperly disposing of hazardous material. But in July, his mother rewon custody and sprung him from Agap. In response to a detailed list of follow-up questions, Clemensen, through Agaps attorney, says he has never abused any boy in the history of Agap, and denied that restraints were ever used for punishment. Exposing Agape is about exactly what it's name says. . Home to a population of 1,600, it has a tiny main square, the worlds largest processor of eastern black walnuts, and 21 churches. Master's Ranch Christian Academy which has had a facility in southern Missouri for more than a decade opened a new location . The desire of 51:10 Youth Ranch is to provide a safe place for children, horses and families. IN THE MONTHS AFTER HIS ARRIVAL, Breshears feelings about Agap changed. (Agap denies any knowledge of these allegations. I believe the community is aware. / AP. When more severe penalties were required, according to students, civil suits, and a search warrant filed later by state investigators, Agap staffers would hold the boys facedown on the floor while pressing their elbows, knees, and fingers into students pressure points, a pain compliance method known as a restraint. Or worse. Agape Ranch-courtesy photo. 1.0 Stephen H. Winter Haven, FL. Shrag is holding an Agape year book. By 5+ Local Business Owners! Send us a tip using our anonymous form. Trending His outrage became open defiance. Lawmakers proposed legislation to provide oversight for faith-based boarding schools in Missouri. Boarding schools fleeing abuse claims in other states find 'Promised Land' in Missouri . NWS confirms EF-1 tornado near Goodman, Mo. (Image: KY3 / Video screengrab) Nineteen former students of an embattled fundamentalist boarding school in Missouri have made new claims of brutal physical and sexual abuse in court filings this month. And in at least 14 other states, education and child welfare agencies exempt boarding schools from licensing requirements if they are privately owned or privately funded. They literally took the practices of Agape and opened up Circle of Hope, so we know for a fact that there is one other school that is ran just like Circle of Hope, and that place is what Circle of Hope modeled their school after, said Amanda Householder, daughter of Circle of Hope operators. Some who attended and worked at the school said otherwise. J.M. Agape Boys Ranch Entrance. After abuse allegations at Circle of Hope Girls' Ranch, a religious boarding school near Agap, began spreading on TikTok last spring, the Cedar County Sheriff's Department opened an investigation, which the state attorney general joined and is ongoing. For many survivors of Agap, that would be tough to accept. Alumni from Agap and Circle of Hope feel the momentum is swinging in their direction. Within months, Jim was both saved and married, and Bryan had a new stepdad. Mr. Lewis, CAP, has been credentialed as a certified alcohol and drug counselor for 20 years. And he encouraged that kind of crap from staff members.. It could last for days on end. He is a manipulator, says Breshears. The founders, Boyd and Stephanie Householder, received 99 charges of sex crimes, child abuse . Just last summer, former students at a pair of Wyoming ranches alleged in an NBC investigation that they had been forced to perform backbreaking manual labor and subjected to traumatic physical and emotional abuse. Sick with a heart condition, Jim left the force in 1979 and moved Kathy, Bryan, and his siblings to Stockton, a sweltering agricultural city on the once-mighty San Joaquin River. But Breshears got a rude welcome. ON SEPT. 7, 2022, ATTORNEY GENERAL SCHMITT and the State Department of Social Services (DSS) filed to close Agap. The school still faces a wave of lawsuits accusing administrators of abuse. Former students of Agape from Alabama, Texas, and Michigan have filed two civil lawsuits against the Boarding School for multiple charges that include physical, sexual, and emotional abuse. Several former staffers opened up similar schools nearby: There was the Legacy Academy Adventures, on a property owned by David Smock, Agaps longtime doctor who would later be accused of molesting students; there was the Masters Ranch Christian Academy, which later opened two more campuses. In recent months, Clemensen has become the face of the controversy a fearless leader doing Gods work to those fighting to save his school, a sadistic villain to those who aim to close it. When I first got there, I just stayed on the low, trying to do my best, hoping to get out, he says. "For nearly three decades, students at Agape Boarding School have experienced emotional, mental, physical . He is pleased to hear the Missouri attorney generals office is now investigating Agape Boarding School. The Department of Social Services declined to comment on its investigations into Agap and the interviews with students, and would not release records, but said that there have been no substantiated reports of abuse or neglect at the school. Attendance at Agape plummeted after abuse allegations surfaced. The 200 Greatest Singers of All Time There is no cost to you, not even if you enroll in any school we might mention to you. Boyd opened the ranch in 2006 as a "school that he claimed could reform rebellious teenage girls," according to NBC News. Thanks to the generous support of The Frazier Family Foundation, Gala sponsors, Gala attendees, and the community, $369,402 was raised in support of the next two homes at The Ranch during the 2021 Legacy Gala: A Matter of Time! A Tri-City Herald story from 1996 said that Franklin County officials ordered the facility to close for code violations over removing and . One killed in officer-involved shooting in Branson, Mo. None of these raised eyebrows until former Agap staffers Boyd and Stephanie Householder opened Circle of Hope Girls Ranch. 2022 maintained by Gibler Shaw Enterprises. The Agape Boarding School was in Othello from 1992-96. vs. Agape Baptist Church Inc., et al: In the complaint filed on August 7, 2021, Alabama plaintiff shared his allegations of abuse while being under the custody of Agape Boarding School from approximately March 2012 to March 2013. Copyright 2023 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. By 14, Breshears says, he was fully in staffers crosshairs. Agap, which according to its parent handbook costs $39,000 a year, is also influenced by Lester Roloff, a radio evangelist and pastor who founded schools for teenage girls in the late 1960s that relied on physical abuse and immersion in biblical teachings to reform them. Agape Ranch will establish a safe environment of. Call us today and find long-term recovery. Ellie Hill Smith, a state lawmaker from Missoula, was concerned that this meant the state had no way of ensuring children were safe in these programs. The AG was on board. Cedar County Prosecutor Gaither says, with the large number of people investigators have been interviewing in the case, hes pleased to have the assistance of the attorney generals office. Boyd and Stephanie Householders daughter says they worked at Agape for four years. Nonetheless, the outcome of the civil suits is far from certain. Montana officials testified at hearings they had been frustrated by complaints registered against several programs that fell outside of regulation, and that some they didnt say which tried to avoid licensing by fraudulently claiming to be part of a church. This results in many children being separated from their siblings and the only community that they know. Former students said their communication with parents and local authorities was censored. The Thrive program will provide housing and mentorship for young adults during their college or trade school career. 90% of young adults aging-out of the foster care system will become homeless, incarcerated, in prostitution, sex trafficked, or dead within three years. Others said they suffered permanent injuries from being disciplined or forced to work long hours of manual labor. Circle of Hope Girls' Ranch was a reformatory boarding school located in Humansville, Missouri.The school opened in July 2006 and was closed in 2020 amid reports and lawsuits filed by former students alleging child abuse, as well as due to an investigation conducted by the Missouri State Highway Patrol.. Before the school's closure, parents, former students, and staff filed multiple reports to . Court records show that David Earl Smock is wanted for assaulting children under 15 at the Agape Boarding School, a Christian private school in Greene County. Via Fox13, the local news station out of Salt Lake City, we get a detailed response to the lawsuit from ranch management: "We at Turn-About Ranch strongly deny the allegations put forward in Ms. Allred's press conference. The allegations of abuse were filed at the Cedar County Circuit . Jim and Kathy Clemensen a married couple whom people call Brother Clemensen and Maam started Agap in the early 1990s. Many of these programs, which are estimated to serve as many as 200,000 kids at any one time, are allowed to operate with virtual impunity, thanks to federal inaction and permissive state laws. He says staff would restrain boys on the ground and use pressure points to the point of bruising. Families looking to adopt are invited to meet, play, and talk to these children, and we need help putting it on. As soon as Keri Ingle, a Democratic state representative from the Kansas City, Missouri, area and former child welfare investigator, read about the abuse allegations at Circle of Hope Girls Ranch last year, she called for hearings. The Clemenson family, who currently runs Agape, has been shut down in two states due to abuse allegations but no charges were ever made. The report found those leaders had chronically mistreated survivors of abuse and spent decades trying to deny responsibility for abuse at individual . He smacked me in the face with his elbow for saying the f-word. If you need expert assistance finding the right program for your boy, fill in this inquiry form or call 888-363-0888 (24/7) for a free, confidential information service (not affiliated with Agape). To report a correction or typo, please email digitalnews@ky3.com, State of Missouri investigating Agape Ranch and Boarding School near Stockton, Deputy seriously hurt in crash with driver opening beer, Greene County prosecutor files charges against man accused of crashing truck into a house. In March 2020, a former Agap student named Joseph Askins stopped in to visit, and witnessed abuse that shocked him. Agape's trouble began in 2020 when former students came forward with abuse allegations. Hymns blared in the classrooms. But then, Breshears made friends and began to reconsider his allegiances particularly, he says, after he witnessed classmates getting restrained. The last time would be his graduation. Its good to be back with family, he says. Paris Hilton's fellow PCS alums said they were stunned to see the heiress, who has amassed 12.6 million followers on Instagram alone, used the hashtag #BreakingCodeSilence in a social media post. We are faith-based, free, and swift to respond. This created an environment ripe for abuse to happen. Schrag says the verbal abuse was constant. Agape Treatment Center offers Drug and Alcohol Rehab as well as Primary Mental Health Treatment. It received initial passage in the house and needs one more vote before going on to the Senate. One morning, he overheard one of the Clemensen daughters asking for help with a math problem, to which Bindley shot back a smartass remark. The glass flew everywhere, he says. Cedar County, Missouri, where Agap is located, is in the heart of the Bible Belt and Clemensen, his stepfather, Jim, who died in October 2021, and his mother, Kathy, long ago convinced the locals they answer to a higher authority. We felt they needed God in their lives. The state, he says, had no clue how to get to a kids heart.. After a months-long investigation, the AGs office recommended 65 charges against 22 staff members, accusing them of abusing 36 children. Its just a very scary place to be, Bradney said. Every year, thousands of young Mormons go on missions to try to recruit others into the religion. When he was told he couldnt live with his mother after her stint in rehab, he threatened to kill himself, and another person from the household. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Clemensen said that the abuse allegations are lies, and suggests they are inspired by the political ambitions of State Attorney General Eric Schmitt who was elected to the U.S. Senate in November and a small group of disgruntled former students hoping for a big payday. What they are claiming would never be OK, he says. Bindley remembers learning quickly that retribution for breaking the rules was swift and sometimes painful. In addition to the fired staffer, DSS has substantiated findings of child abuse or neglect against Bryan Clemensen and two other Agap employees, according to The Kansas City Star. For example, Arkansas allows boarding schools and child welfare agencies operated solely by a religious organization to be exempt from licensing. Churches of Christ don't have enough preachers to fill all the open pulpits in our fellowship. Appalled, he used his phone to surreptitiously record Boyd Householder, who appeared to be ordering Circle of Hope students to physically assault one of their classmates. And I did get saved.. Agape now has roughly 60 students, about half of the population the school had in early 2021 when the Missouri Highway Patrol and DSS launched an investigation into abuse allegations. The BBC was given access to their UK boot camp, where they learn how to teach Mormon beliefs and use social media to reach potential converts. But many lawmakers are also oblivious to the consequences of lax oversight until there's a scandal. Missouri has been a particular hotbed for religious schools since 1982, when the state passed a law exempting faith-based residential child-care facilities from state oversight. Recently, individuals associated with Agap have been accused of a growing list of crimes. (Photo by Tim Bommel/House Communications) But in Missouri, only the local prosecutor can file charges, and Cedar County Prosecuting Attorney Ty Gaither has said no additional employees would be charged. Minnesota has even less control. In August, Sandoval was charged with arranging the kidnapping of an emancipated teen in Fresno, California, on behalf of the boys estranged mother, and then having him driven, handcuffed, 27 hours to Agap. More than a dozen people reported abuse at a religious boarding school in rural Missouri before the owners' daughter launched a campaign that got action. (Clemensen says this was a nickname the boys had for an elbow injury, and denies the abuse.) Editors picks (KY3) - Missouris attorney general is investigating a second Cedar County boarding school. Allen Knoll, who attended Agap from 1999 to 2001, looks at Alabamas law as a template of what we can do across the country. The only thing that has held back change in Missouri, he said, is a lack of public knowledge about what goes on inside these schools. When 19-year-old Rebekah Cooper started her mission, she had to give up her first name . . In 2021, Agape's longtime doctor, David Smock, was charged with child sex crimes and five employees were charged with low-level abuse counts. Throughout the 1980s, Kathy and Jim fostered children whose parents were in jail. Bryan, by then in his twenties, was working in a state-funded group home. Meanwhile, tales of abuse continue to emerge. Regretfully, child abuse and neglect have continued to rise and the work of Agape Ranch is needed now more than ever. ), Other students describe staffers encouraging classmates to fight one another, and cutting off communication with loved ones when they complained. Hed hoped to get kicked out, which didnt happen. He would later help stage an uprising as an attempt to get thrown out of the school. One student said staffers had branded him with a cross. Agape Boarding School was moving away from the "nonbelievers" in Washington and California and heading east. abuse at agape I have spent the last 5 days at agape boys ranch helping with the annual horse sale. And he said, No, theyre not. He cuffed me up and dropped me back off at Agap. The former director of Agape Boarding School pleaded with a Cole County judge on Monday to keep himself off the state's central registry of child abuse and . Yet the delays have frustrated state lawmakers. Gaither declined to comment, but told the Cedar County Republican that Agap has the right to administer corporal punishment. According to AG Schmitts office, the Cedar County Sheriffs Department employs at least three people who used to work at Agap. The school follows a fundamentalist Baptist belief system, according to a 2002 St. Louis Post-Dispatch article, and displayed a photo of the radio evangelist Lester Roloff, who died in a plane crash in 1982. Federal lawmakers say they plan to introduce legislation to curtail abuses in the industry. As owners of the Circle of Hope Ranch, the couple faces 100 criminal abuse charges between them. At the time of reporting, he is not yet in police custody, and an arrest warrant has been issued in his name. He is living in California with his mother, Jennifer, and attending a public high school. DSS added . Though the area is largely Baptist, Cedar County has a tradition of religious tolerance. But he would soon come to suffer horrifying abuse, he says experiences in line with what at least 18 former Agap students have recently alleged in lawsuits. KANSAS CITY, Mo. An investigation by NBC News and Dateline found that multiple states have similar gaps in the oversight of religious boarding schools, leaving children vulnerable to abuse. Carlson said he never witnessed abuse and credited the school with temporarily keeping him off meth and teaching him how to lay tile. Agape Boarding School in Stockton has been the subject of state and local investigations and several lawsuits from former students. A judge ordered the school closed only to put the order on hold after Agap fired the staffer in question. Those details were outlined in motions filed in 19 civil lawsuits requesting that the Cedar County judge overseeing those cases allow .
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