This is the first of a two-part series.
Through a multimillion-dollar lawsuit, the parents of 13-year-old Jonathan Carey say they are trying to right a wrong.
The parents of the autistic child are currently involved in a civil suit against Jonathan’s former school, which they say caused lasting mental and physical damage to their son. They are hoping the lawsuit sets an example that leads to genuine reform at schools that care for the mentally and physically disabled.
They are also seeking new state legislation to open up doors to information about investigation results that can be crucial to parents of disabled children.
Jonathan’s parents, Michael and Lisa Carey, contend that the boy’s time spent at the Anderson School has forever changed him.
He was not the same boy remotely that he was before he went to that school, said Michael Carey.
The two parties recently went through depositions in a civil suit in which the Careys are seeking $5.75 million in damages from the school.
At his office at Bethlehem’s Solo Auto Sales, which Michael Carey owns and operates, he and his wife, Lisa, weave a story of abuse, neglect and misinformation at the hands of the staff at the Anderson School, a private school located in Staatsburg, a small hamlet in Dutchess County.
The school is a residential program that provides high-quality programs for children and adults with autism and other develop-mental disabilities.
The Careys’ story as caretakers of a child with special needs began long before their son’s alleged abuse. Jonathan was diagnosed with a form of autism early in life, after he began to shows signs of mental retardation including poor balance, hyperactivity and lack of communication skills.
Jonathan started treatment at the age of 2, and he was seen regularly by four different therapists. He attended a preschool program designed for special education students and then attended the Wildwood School for children with developmental disabilities until he was 9.
Following his time at Wildwood, his parents said they made the decision in January 2003 to send their son away to school when, at the age of 9, he had still not demonstrated the ability to perform the most basic of tasks that other kids his age could do; for instance, he was not effectively toilet-trained.
The Anderson School came highly recommended to the Glenmont residents, who have another son, Joshua, 9, who is not autistic. The Careys heard it had, among other things, an excellent toilet-training program.
The decision to send their son to a residential program away from home, even if it may have been better for him in the long run, was difficult, said the parents, and weekend visits were especially hard.
`Him watching us walk away was very difficult,` said Michael Carey.
But their son, they were told, was making progress.
`He was doing pretty well, making a lot of gains, as far as we know,` said Lisa, adding that Jonathan was dressing himself and was using the toilet 50 percent of the time.
In September 2004, the parents first learned that something might be awry.
`We had a few sporadic calls that Jonathan was taking off his shirt,` said Michael Carey. `It was a new thing; we’d never seen it before.`
The next month, Michael said, the school’s director Neil Pollack called the parents and said Jonathan was in a `crisis situation,` experiencing emotional difficulties. Later that day, the school’s nurse said Jonathan had bruises all over his body. The Careys said the nurse did not reveal the extent of the bruising.
Michael drove to Staatsburg first thing the next morning. When he arrived, he said, there was an aide stationed outside the door to Jonathan’s room.
Inside the room, Michael said, his son was lying naked on his bed, on top of only a sheet, which was soaked in urine. When his son finally looked up at his father, Michael described the look as `shell-shocked.`
`I was shocked at the amount of bruises,` said Michael.
The Careys obtained student injury/illness reports from the school for the week of Oct. 7, 2004, which pointed to a number of bruises and abrasions on Jonathan’s body. The bruises, reported as new and old, are noted to appear on Jonathan’s legs, back, face and arms. One of the notes on the report read: `Advised staff of need to monitor pressure applied during restraint.`
This note stood out to the Careys.
`Obviously there was a question on how they restrained our son,` said Lisa.
While speaking with staff, Lisa said, one individual told her that Jonathan was flailing himself against the door to get out of the room.
Two injury reports, dated Oct. 7 and 9, list the injuries as self-inflicted and received while flopping to the floor and bumping into objects.
According to the parents, things were only going to get worse.
`We didn’t find out until a week and a half later that they were not feeding him when he had his shirt off,` said Lisa.
During an Oct. 18, 2004, visit, Michael and Lisa said a staff member insisted they take a clothing bag home with them ` something they had never been asked to do in the past.
When the Careys returned home, they said they found a journal inside the bag containing daily updates from staff members who cared for their son.
It was then, the Careys said, `We realized what they were doing.`
A Sept. 23 entry in the journal the Careys said came from the school describes Jonathan’s behavior as `defiant and aggressive most of the day.`
One handwritten excerpt reads: `He refused lunch (refused to put his clothes on). All he had to do was put his shirt on to eat. As of 2 p.m. he had not eaten lunch, nor had he eaten breakfast.`
The next paragraph states: `When J.C. does eat his diet is adhered to.` Later in the entry, a staff member writes, `As was writing he put his shirt on and ate all of his food and drank a glass of water. Food consisted of Taco salad, rice and corn.`
The last entry on Sept. 23 detailing Jonathan’s diet states: `A tough day/week and a half but there was a glimmer of light when he finally broke down and put his shirt on to eat.`
This and other entries like it prove, said Jonathan’s parents, that their son was not allowed to eat when his shirt was off. If nothing else, it demonstrates to them that their son’s behavior plan was changed without the required approval of the parents or the Bethlehem school district, which oversees Jonathan’s individualized education plan.
`He went on a bus (for home) and never went back again,` said Lisa. The Careys said that upon his return home, Jonathan gained eight pounds in four weeks.
A series of letters and investigations by several of the school’s regulatory agencies and law enforcement followed.
A letter dated Dec. 20, 2004, from the Taconic Developmental Disabilities Services Office to the Careys states: `The investigation substantiated many of your complaints. Specifically, there was clear evidence that you were not actively involved in the develop-ment of Jonathan’s plan of care.`
Another letter, following an investigation from the Commission on Quality of Care found that no documentation existed that showed that the Careys were involved in the development of the school’s plan for Jonathan. That letter, dated April 28, 2005, also stated: `the commission found no clear evidence that staff were withholding food from Jonathan as a punishment.`
It adds that staff did withhold regular meals and offered basic nutritional supplements, such as soy milk, soy yogurt and juice, as part of his behavioral plan.
While noting that he was unable to discuss the status of the school’s residents ` past or present `Director Neil Pollack spoke of the Anderson School’s general policies and said its reputation speaks for itself.
`We have hundreds of families that are thrilled with the quality of the services that the Anderson School provides,` said Pollack. `We enjoy a remarkably successful program.`
Pollack went on to say that some individuals and families have difficulty coping when a loved one is sick or disabled.
`We unfortunately live in a society where you’ll have, in the rarest of occasions ` maybe in one out of 1,000 ` you’ll have an individual or family that will work with a hospital, school, church, synagogue, nursing home or a place like Anderson School, where the family has such a difficult time accepting the incurable state of a situation that they seek an alternate approach to resolving it,` said Pollack.
Pollack added that the school does not use any sort of negative reinforcement in its procedures.
`Within behavior modification, on very rare occasions, I’ve observed some agencies, out of state, that will use negative reinforcement. Anderson School does not, has not and never will use such types of negative reinforcement,` said Pollack, who also credited the state with leading the way in banning electroshock therapy as a means of behavior management.
Pollack said abuses at the hands of his staff would be unlikely.
On a day-to-day basis, said Pollack, the interaction between the school’s staff, students and adults from the entire senior management staff is `intensive, daily and highly interactive.`
The Careys said proof exists of their son’s abuse in the form of a 400-page report from the state Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities (OMRDD), but due to state law, they can’t see it. As a result, the parents are seeking legislation to change the law and open the doors to parents like themselves to the results of investigations that could shine the light onto abuses of the developmentally disabled.
While his parents work on the legislation, Jonathan is enrolled at the O.D. Heck Developmental Center in Schenectady.
PART II of this report will be about the Michael and Lisa Careys’ struggle to get `Jonathan’s Law` passed, which would open access to investigative files concerning their son. “
