Tranquility Bay

Tranquility Bay was an abusive residential treatment facility affiliated with World Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools (WWASPS), located in Calabash Bay, Saint Elizabeth Parish, Jamaica.<ref name="MaiaGoodNewsBad">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":0">Home Page. Tranquility Bay. August 13, 2003. Retrieved on October 2, 2010. "Tranquility Bay, Calabash Bay P.A., St. Elizabeth, Jamaica 876-965-0003."</ref> The facility operated from 1997 to 2009 and received notoriety for its harsh and often abusive treatment of its students, eventually shutting down in 2009 after allegations of child abuse came to light through lawsuits and highly publicized student testimonies.<ref name="The Last Resort"/><ref name=MaiaGoodNewsBad/> The adolescents reported violence to their parents, only to be ignored.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

History

The director was Jay Kay, a college dropout with no training in child development who ran a mini-mart in San Diego,<ref name="The Last Resort">Decca Aitkenhead, "The Last Resort", The Guardian, 29 June 2003.</ref><ref name="No More Nightmares at Tranquility Bay?">"No More Nightmares at Tranquility Bay?"</ref> and who is son of WWASPS president Ken Kay. The cost for one child ranged from $25,000 to $40,000 a year.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Tranquility Bay was generally acknowledged as the toughest of the WWASPS schools.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> As with other WWASPS facilities, Tranquility Bay has been the subject of much controversy, including allegations of torture, unsanitary living conditions, unqualified employees, and denial of medical care;<ref>TBFight.com: Tranquility Bay & WWASP website</ref> these claims have been the subject of multiple lawsuits from former Tranquility Bay residents.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In 1998 was the focus of a legal case after neighbors of a family reported parents to police for kidnapping and false imprisonment by sending him to Tranquility Bay.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Judge Ken Kawaichi denied the writ of habeas corpus due to lack of evidence of abuse at Tranquility bay.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Tranquility Bay stated that it was dedicated to helping parents who are having difficulty with their children, whether they are doing drugs, breaking the law, or being disobedient or disrespectful. In 2003, Kay said "if I have kids, and they start giving me a problem, well, they are going straight in the program. If I had to, I'd pull the trigger without hesitation";<ref name="The Last Resort"/> however, in 1999, Kay (who at that time was not working for WWASPS) said that the Tranquility Bay staff were "untrained", without "credentials of any kind", and that Tranquility Bay "could be leading these kids to long-term problems that we don't have a clue about because we're not going about it in the proper way".<ref name=weiner>Tim Weiner, Parents Divided Over Jamaica Disciplinary Academy, The New York Times, June 17, 2003.</ref>

Children as young as 12 were admitted to Tranquility Bay, for reasons ranging from drug use to conflicts with a new stepmother.<ref name=weiner/> From 2002 to 2005 the Government of the Cayman Islands sent some delinquent youth to Tranquility Bay; the government funded the students as they were located in Tranquility Bay.<ref>Pioro, Basia. "Controversy surrounds Tranquility Bay Template:Webarchive." Caymanian Compass. Tuesday 13 July 2006. Retrieved on 9 August 2010.</ref>

On the 7th of December 2004 the British Broadcasting Company aired a program on BBC Two called Locked in Paradise.<ref name=":0" />

Tranquility Bay was shut down in January 2009,<ref name=MaiaGoodNewsBad/> after the case of Isaac Hersh gained national media and political attention and years of alleged abuse and torture came to light.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Many politicians, including Hillary Clinton, were involved in Isaac's release.Template:Citation needed

Controversies

Observation Placement

Observation Placement was a punishment that could demote any student to level one and take away all their points. During Observation Placement, people were forced to lay down on their faces. Some people spent 18 months in this punishment.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Transportation

Tranquility Bay used teen escort companies to facilitate the transportation of youths from the United States of America to their facility in Jamaica. This would normally take place in the early hours of the morning and often involved the use of handcuffs.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Representation in Intervention

The "Cassie" episode of the A&E program Intervention, first shown in January 2011, features a young woman addicted to prescription painkillers who had been sent to Tranquility Bay as a child and blamed her father for not rescuing her.<ref>Template:Cite episode</ref> In the episode, Cassie said that her fellow residents consumed "chemicals" so they would be sent to the hospital and would be able to talk to their parents regarding the abuse they were enduring. However, she said that when they vomited in response to the poison, rather than being sent to a hospital, they were restrained by staff face down in their own vomit.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Further reading

• Art, Cindy. 2012. Trapped in Paradise, A Memoir. Template:ISBN. An account of an attendee's time at Tranquility Bay.

External links

• Tranquility Bay website - Template:Webarchive
• Template:YouTube