Seven American boys are being held in the custody of Jamaican child welfare authorities, more than six weeks after they were pulled from a school for troubled teens because of abuse allegations.
The boys were attending Atlantis Leadership Academy in Treasure Beach, along the island’s south coast, which advertises itself as a faith-based school serving teenagers who are struggling with substance abuse, anxiety disorders and defiant behavior.
Then, according to an email the Jamaican Child Protection and Family Services Agency sent parents last month, the agency received information that children at the program “were being mistreated, amounting to abuse,” and as a result had removed them. The agency planned to work with state child protection services to return the boys to the U.S., according to the email, which a parent shared with NBC News.
The children are being held in Jamaican group homes, according to attorneys working on their behalf.
The Child Protection and Family Services Agency in Jamaica did not elaborate on the type of alleged abuse and said it cannot comment due to the ongoing investigation. It’s unclear how the allegations came to light.
Atlantis Leadership Academy did not respond to requests for comment. In a letter to parents, Randall Cook, the program’s director, said: “With our reputation and transparency, no one could believe something like this could have occurred, nor that we are in any way an abusive organization.”
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Tarah Fleischman, 59, whose special needs son, Cody, is among the boys pulled from the academy, said she’s frustrated by the long wait to bring her son home to Wisconsin and upset by the mistreatment she alleges her son faced there.
Cody, 16, who is diagnosed with Tourette syndrome, obsessive compulsive disorder and ADHD, arrived at Atlantis last May and has lost a significant amount of weight since then, she said. Fleischman was not allowed to speak to Cody while he was at…
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