The Bay County, Florida sheriff has decided to close the now-notorious boot camp where 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson died after a half-hour confrontation with up to nine guards. The guards alternately beat, restrained, kneed and then tried to revive teen who had been in the camp less than two hours, having been sent there for violating probation after going joyriding with another teen in his grandmother's car. According to this morning's St. Pete Times:
Sheriff to shut boot camp
A Panama City juvenile boot camp will be shut down and Hillsborough County State Attorney Mark Ober will investigate the death of a teenager who had been beaten by guards at the camp.
In rapid-fire developments Tuesday, the treatment of another boy raised new questions about operations at the camp, and the medical examiner who concluded the teenager died of a blood disorder renewed his medical license, which expired last month.
Despite the controversy, Gov. Jeb Bush reaffirmed his support of Florida's five boot camps.
"I believe that boot camps are worth having," said Bush, who appointed Ober as special prosecutor. "We need to learn from this tragic case and make some standard, regulatory proposals to the Legislature."
Boot camps are military-style programs designed to shock juvenile delinquents into complying with the law and to teach them discipline, study skills and work habits. They require rigorous physical training such as pushups and running.
Several lawmakers want all the boot camps closed in light of a security video showing guards at the Bay County facility beating Martin Lee Anderson even as he gave little or no resistance.
Medical Examiner Charles Siebert concluded the teenager died of sickle cell trait, not from the beating. But even Bush questioned that conclusion.
"If he wasn't beat up, that undetected illness wouldn't have caused death," Bush said.
The governor appointed Ober to investigate the death. Bay County State Attorney Steve Meadows begged off because of his close ties to Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen.
Ober's investigation will include the autopsy, Bush said, "to take a look at that evidence and put some new eyes on it."
McKeithen operates the boot camp under contract with the state Department of Juvenile Justice. He has not spoken much about the tragedy, saying he wanted to wait for the investigation to conclude.
But Tuesday McKeithen announced he would cancel the boot camp contract with the state in 90 days. He declined comment, saying he would issue a written statement today.
"I believe the integrity of the boot camp in Bay County has been compromised, leaving the effectiveness of this program virtually paralyzed," he wrote to Anthony J. Schembri, who heads the Department of Juvenile Justice. He wrote that he decided to close the camp "after endless days of intense, thorough and careful consideration."
McKeithen, who said he has seen "some very positive results" from the boot camp, wrote that he wants to create a new juvenile program "which we have been working on for several months."
Let's hope that new program doesn't include nine-on-one inmate "restraint."
Meanwhile, there now could be a witness in the case, should it go forward at Justice (there will also be a civil suit, which a state legislator has vowed to pass an item having the state fund beyond Florida's $200,000 liability cap.) From the Tallahassee Democrat:
Local woman says son told her 'they killed that boy' By Stephen D. Price
A Tallahassee mother said Tuesday her 14-year-old son was in juvenile boot camp with Martin Lee Anderson, and he described what guards did to Anderson as "murder."
That revelation came the same day Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen announced he would close the county's boot camp where guards struck 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson.
"I feel really bad for this lady and every other child that doesn't deserve this type of treatment," said Shauna Manning, referring to Anderson's mother, Gina Jones. "That's why I'm here, to speak out on behalf of her child." ...
... Manning visited her son, Aaron Swartz, at the Bay County boot camp three days after Anderson's incident with the guards, she said Tuesday in the law office of Tallahassee attorney Benjamin Crump, who represents Anderson's family.
"He said they killed that boy," Manning said.
She said her son told her guards had pegged Anderson for a troublemaker when he first arrived at the camp because he wore braids. The day the incident occurred, Anderson was being cooperative and had run 15 laps of the 16-lap run he was required to do, until he began having breathing problems.
The guards then confronted Anderson, Manning said her son told her, and began hitting him.
Manning's son was later transferred to another boot camp.
Manning's son also has alleged that his asthma was ignored by doctors at the camp,and he complained about authorities at the camp forcing ammonia capsules up his nose, and using restraint and "pressure" techniques similar to those seen on the security videotape that captured the preamble to Anderson's death.
There's also this from the SP Times story above, regarding medical examiner Charles Siebert:
... When Siebert concluded Martin died of natural causes, he was practicing without a medical license. His license expired Jan. 31 and he did not renew it - until Tuesday.
He renewed it in person in Tallahassee, said Doc Kokol, spokesman for the Florida Department of Health. Siebert will be fined $385 for practicing without a license for a month.
First-time offenders like Siebert generally aren't disciplined further, Kokol said. Fewer than 3 percent of physicians whose licenses must be renewed fail to do so in an average year, Kokol said.
The teen's family is challenging his report, though they have not said how they will do so.
Options include filing a complaint with the state Medical Examiners Commission and asking an independent pathologist to review the files, photographs and slides that Siebert made during the autopsy. The family also could exhume the body for a new autopsy.
"We haven't ruled anything out," said Crump, the attorney.
The Medical Examiners Commission looks to see "if something was just blatantly overlooked, or somebody had drawn the wrong conclusions," said Stephen Nelson, commission chairman and Polk County's medical examiner.
Let's open all this up. And we'll see then whether Florida's boot camp program, now just four camps strong, is really worth saving.
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"[T]he practice of arbitrary imprisonments, have been, in all ages, the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.' Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 84, August, 1788
