Tough Love Kills, Too

Radley Balko | October 11, 2007

Appropos of Jacob's post below...

Omega Leach, the Philadelphia teen killed in June after the city sent him to a Tennessee treatment center, died of strangulation after a fight with a staff member there, according to the Tennessee medical examiner.

The death has been ruled a homicide, the autopsy report says.

Bruce P. Levy found that Leach had "multiple hemorrhages" of his neck muscles from a clash June 2 with two staffers at the Chad Youth Enhancement Center outside Nashville.

[...]

Philadelphia's Department of Human Services has been sending some of the most troubled kids in its care to Chad since at least 2001. In 2005, after a drumbeat of warnings about harsh treatment and the death of a 14-year-old girl, DHS and city courts continued to use Chad even as Tennessee and New York state pulled their youngsters from the facility.

While Leach's death prompted Philadelphia officials to start removing youngsters from Chad, eight city youths were still housed there, a city official said last night.

[...]

Tennessee repeatedly cited Chad for failing to tell regulators about children who had been injured there. In one case, the state learned only after the victim's mother called police that three residents had tried to strangle another, records show.

The Inquirer also reported that in early 2005, a man called the Philadelphia child-abuse hotline and warned that his coworkers were using "improper and illegal" force against city youngsters.

In response, DHS dispatched an investigator to Chad - three months later. The city concluded that while there had been no "illegal physical restraints," nonetheless "some residents were being harshly and improperly restrained."

In reply, Chad said it had a "nurturing and positive environment," but would hire more staff.

Link here.

Comments

Juanita|10.11.07 @ 11:42AM|#

Oh well...But everyone always gets what they deserve. If the kid obeyed the law he would not have been sent there.

Juanita|10.11.07 @ 11:43AM|#

Of course, this may server well to "make an example" for other kids tempted to break any law.

VM|10.11.07 @ 11:50AM|#

Radley -

thank you for all of your work! I have alerted many-a-person to your excellent, tireless efforts. The reaction, "I never knew...!". Thank you for shining the light on dark incidents such as this.

ed|10.11.07 @ 12:23PM|#

This makes perfect sense. We're killing the children (wait for it) for the children.

Judge Smails|10.11.07 @ 12:33PM|#

I've sentenced boys younger than you to the gas chamber. Didn't want to do it. I felt I owed it to them.

Episiarch|10.11.07 @ 12:36PM|#

Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

johnnykrisma|10.11.07 @ 12:52PM|#

Juanita please tell me that's cynicism I'm hearing...

The Chad|10.11.07 @ 12:57PM|#

I am shocked--SHOCKED-- at these atrocities committed under my name.

|10.11.07 @ 12:57PM|#

No, Johnny, it's Juanita. She's either a satirist or a troll-no one knows for sure.

|10.11.07 @ 1:08PM|#

Another caualty in the WoD. Funny, the casualties seem to be mostly American.

|10.11.07 @ 1:12PM|#

My bad! No mention on why he was sent there was provided. I jumped to an unwarranted conclusion. Oops!

|10.11.07 @ 1:54PM|#

He was sent there for stealing a car. He was in and out of juvenile detention since the age of 11.

He exhibited plenty of antisocial behavior in his short life, but was put in a place where even the 22 year old guards exhibit plenty of antisocial behavior.
It is still not right to choke him to death.

Timothy|10.11.07 @ 2:15PM|#

Maybe Philly should start just sending kids here.

Anonymo the Anonymous|10.11.07 @ 4:27PM|#

Bruce P. Levy found that Leach had "multiple hemorrhages" of his neck muscles from a clash June 2 with two staffers at the Chad Youth Enhancement Center outside Nashville.

How the hell do you get multiple hemorrhages of your neck muscles? It sounds like whoever's responsible for this place is lucky the kid's dead and not spending every penny the guards, owners and their insurance companies have from the comfort of a wheelchair.

neubauten666|10.11.07 @ 5:23PM|#

Having lived in Philadelphia most of my life, I can speak for many residents that would like to see a significant number of the children in that city deported to Chad

Paul|10.12.07 @ 2:28AM|#

Philadelphia's Department of Human Services has been sending some of the most troubled kids in its care to Chad since at least 2001.

Sending kids to a small, war-torn African nation seems a bit extreme to me.

Marvel Comics|10.12.07 @ 7:04AM|#

'Omega Leach' sounds like the sort of apocalyptic super-villain that would fight the Hulk.

|10.12.07 @ 1:30PM|#

It would have been quicker to put a gun to his head, and pulled ther trigger. Why did he even get to "treatment"? What the heck were they treating? I guess, it is now the death penalty for kids who can't get it together, or have real severe, underlying, psychiatric problems. Maybe we could get a, big, decrease in, the population of, bad kids, with this method! Granted, he may have been a murderer waiting to happen. But, I did not think we punished people for crimes they MIGHT commit! Just another advance in the rehabilitation of criminal juveniles in our country. What a mess!

|10.12.07 @ 1:36PM|#

Juanita = troll....
"Oh well...But everyone always gets what they deserve. If the kid obeyed the law he would not have been sent there."

"Of course, this may server well to "make an example" for other kids tempted to break any law."

Yeah, that will do it. Last time I checked murder was illegal, yet here in the USA we enjoy the highest murder rate in the western "civilized" world. It doesn't seem like much of a deterent does it?

MMMMM me like fascism.