11/10/05

Jordan,
I have inserted some comments that you can share or not share with mother as you see fit.
Henry Lawton

DeKim Cole's Letter to PTAVE, November 7, 2005, 11:52 AM

Good Morning,

I realize God is real without reading Mr. Lawton 'False allure of the boot camp.' But reading this letter only confirms the way I feel about a boot camp. I paid an Attorney to make sure my son would not be sent to a boot camp, but this person was paid $400.00 by me to represent my son. The court appointed Attorney would have been $125.00, but I could not take chance on having my son end up in a boot camp or some other bad place. It was the actual Attorney order or request to have him go to one.

It sounds as if your attorney was not acting in accordance with your wishes. He should have told you what he planned to do & why. Is this Martel's first court, or has had previous charges? To what extent was there effort made to assess your son's issues? It sounds as if no attention was given to this question & he was simply assessed as having such & such charge(s) without consideration of why he was getting in trouble. If Texas does such things as pre-disposition reports to make recommendations to the judge, it sounds as if they are cursory at best. Courts tend to think in terms of behavior problems more than emotional issues unless it is spelled out for them clearly & simply.

This has been a nightmare and as of yesterday my son was attacked in the camp and spoken to by the DI (Drill Person (s) like a dog. He was to have stayed in the camp for 4 months, but I wrote letters after letters explaining the caseworker said he would only be there a month plus 15 days if he does not make the points. Long story short my son has been there since September 13, 2005. And now that he did not make the points, the caseworker said he would be there until January/February 2006. My son has been anger and upset for a year now. He started to push me (Physically) and I was informed that I have a tumor & so many other problems with his acting out in school caused me to call the police on him.

Ok, here you touch on the real point. He has been developing problems at least for the last year. It sounds as if you have a number of physical health issues that may be serious. I wonder if your son might not be acting out because he wants to help, does not know what to, and is terrified that you are going to die or get so ill there will be no one to take care of him. When kids act out they are usually expressing feelings via action that they cannot verbalize. Is dad, in the picture at all? If so, is he a positive influence? I sense he is not (but may well be wrong). If Martell had any sense that he could have gone to dad & dad was there for him he would probably be in better shape.

But keep in mind this is the reason I obtained an Attorney to keep him out of harms way. Because I did not know the police would consider this assault, he pushed me to the wall.

No one explained the nature and seriousness of the charges to you?? Did you make any effort to get him into therapy? A decent therapist might have helped.

Who did? Was this presented to the judge by the lawyer & probation & he just rubber stamped it?

This is the very reason I obtained the Attorney for him to prevent him form being treated badly and unfair. I Love my son so very much. I do not know what to do now.

A couple thoughts come to mind: -

1. Get a new lawyer who will work with you rather than against you to meet your son's needs.
2. Get a decent psychological, psychiatric, social evaluation done on that you can present to the court in support of a non-boot camp solution.
3. Tell Martell that if you do #1 & 2, it will be in his interest to admit his problems and accept therapeutic help. If he cannot or won't there is not much you can do. He needs to understand his options even if the truth is painful.
4. Draft a viable plan for resolving Martell's problems that you can give to the court. If the judge is given a soundly conceived alternative he might agree to go with it.

Again, I actually was able to have the camp change his stay to 45 days, but it's been so hard on him. They act as if they are the judge, prosecutor, and jury since he pushed his mother.

You are probably correct

I think they themselves need emotional help also.

Very likely true

He was attacked and punched in the nose on Saturday. And no one called me to let me know about this once. I called Sunday 11/06/05 several times to speak with the caseworker and at that time I was informed about the nose punch. Mr. Lawton as painful as it for me, this is a true statement some children become victim of this system because I trusted this attorney.

As a general rule you should always ask questions until you are clear about what will occur and why. If you did not do this, do it in the future, you are, after all, paying the guy. More children than you realize become victims of the system. Reasons for this vary greatly

I do not want my son to become a lawsuit case if he gets hurt while in this Godless place.

There may be no choice. I suspect that Texas may have inadequate laws governing situations of Institutional abuse. You should try & find out. In my state the law requires that all involved parties be told of any sort of situation like this.

The DI's are pushing him so hard and the kids (per the supervisor are in gangs also). If there are gangs in Cy-Fair/Katy Texas we do not know about them. The only person I think now can help us is the Judge, because I am one person with two sons. One is on the Dean list at A &M, in Texas and this is my little boy (just this last year has been really difficult to handle). Please know I am putting it mildly. But I love him and want him home. I wish we were Blessed enough to have seen this article prior to me making a phone call. I was just at the end of my rope and now I rather die from the tumor and not have him stay in this hellhole. It's only a matter of time before they start talking to him again about TYC (Texas Youth Commission) or keeps him there longer.

If the court put him in this place as a condition of a suspended sentence to the TYC, unless you can present a plan to the court that it will find more agreeable than what has already been done, you may have no choice but to cooperate. Going to the TYC would be far worse than where he is now.

This is a good child, but I had been dealing with him at school for more than three years getting into trouble. The last year has been too interesting with him. God help us to get him out, I am the only one trying to save him. His father/my ex-husband has stated that he needs to be sent to his country since we are not good educator here in the United States and lack corporate punishment also.

So dad has no understanding of the issues.

Let's not even speak any more of him, just save a good child. I only wanted him to learn you cannot push me at home by having the police speak with him.

That is not enough, your son should have had decent therapy to help him understand the emotional reasons for his conduct & hopefully change in the bargain.

Boot camps are inherently abusive as you stated. This is the reason I must do something about this Attorney's actions. I also think of this as a true statement, "How many unjust and wicked things are done from habit." Can you give me any direction to save my son? My son must be saved and I fear for him now. Try to keep in mind I tried with my son for years to have him change.

I do not doubt this, but he still needs decent therapy with someone experience with teens.

But he has never in the past pushed me prior to these times. I promise before the Lord he is very sweet! I sent the attached letter out to help him stay the 45 days as promised by the first caseworker. I only want one more chance to help him understand he is loved and will be helped by loving people & caring people. He stated last night he does not want to live any more.

He could be lying to manipulate you but as you describe it I suspect not. This is perhaps something you could use to sway the court to allow a different direction.

- Please help us, please.

Thank you so much
DeKim Cole dekimcole@sbcglobal.net