The center, believed to be the only school in the nation that uses a
two-second skin-shock punishment to change destructive behavior, is no
stranger to controversy. It has survived two attempts by the state to
close it amid allegations that its unorthodox methods amount to abuse.

http://wbztv.com/local/shock.treatments.prank.2.614971.html

Staff members at a group home made multiple mistakes when they
followed a prank caller's direction to give dozens of electrical
shocks to two emotionally disturbed teenagers, according to a report
by a state agency that investigated the incident.

The report by the Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care
said six staffers at a Stoughton residence run by the Canton-based
Judge Rotenberg Education Center had ample reason to doubt the orders
to administer the shocks, but did nothing to stop it.

The six staff members and video surveillance worker on duty that night
have been fired, Ernest Corrigan, the school's spokesman, said
Thursday.

Initial investigations showed that a former student at the Judge
Rotenberg Education Center allegedly called in orders for electric
shock treatments on Aug. 26 and officials at the school self-reported
the prank call and unnecessary treatments the day after they
occurred, Cindy Campbell, a spokeswoman for the state Department of
Early Education and Care, said Monday.

After the call, the teens, ages 16 and 19, were awakened in the middle
of the night and given the shock treatments, at times while their legs
and arms were bound. One teen received 77 shocks and the other
received
29. One boy was treated for two first-degree burns.

The caller posed as a supervisor and said he was ordering the
punishments because the teens had misbehaved earlier in the evening.
But none of the staffers had witnessed any problems, and other boys
said the two teens had done nothing wrong. One boy suggested the call
was a hoax.

The report says the caller was a former resident of the center with
intimate knowledge of the staff, residents and layout of the Stoughton
home. No motive was given and the caller's identity wasn't disclosed.
Police are looking into filing criminal charges.

Five of the six staffers had worked a double or triple shift and most
had been on the job less than three months. The staffers were
described as concerned and reluctant about the orders, but failed to
verify them with the central office or check treatment plans to make
sure the teens could receive that level of shock therapy, the report
said. Staffers also didn't know who the shift supervisor was that
night.

Staff members realized their mistake after someone finally called the
central office.

One reason staffers might not have been suspicious of the phone call
is that the Rotenberg Center uses surveillance cameras in its group
homes to monitor residents and staff, and a central office employee
is allowed to initiate discipline by phone.

"We found that there were breaches of internal control procedures that
happened in this particular case," Campbell said. "We take this very
seriously."

Corrigan said an incident like the faulty shock treatments after a
phone call has never happened before.

"We have modified procedures to assure that an incident of this type
cannot occur ever again," Corrigan said.

As a result of the investigation, the center has expanded staff
training, implemented new telephone verification procedures, added
oversight at group homes and eliminated delayed punishment.

Nancy Alterio, executive director of the state's Disabled Persons
Protection Committee, confirmed that her agency is investigating a
complaint that a third victim -- an adult -- at the a residential
facility in Stoughton run by the Rotenberg center also received
unnecessary shock treatments after the phone call.

"It was a perfect storm of things that went wrong that night," he
said.

The complaints have also been referred to the state police and the
Norfolk District Attorney's Office, Alterio said.

The school treats people with a wide variety of behavior problems,
including autistic-like students who have aggressive, self-injurious
or destructive behaviors and high-functioning students with
psychiatric or emotional problems, according to a description posted
on its web site.

"The so-called prank call ... was an isolated, unprecedented incident
that occurred more than three months ago," Corrigan said in a
statement released Monday. "We immediately reported it to the
appropriate state agencies and the local police."

The state Department of Early Education and Care said it investigated
a complaint about two youths -- ages 16 and 19 -- who were given
unnecessary shock treatments on Aug. 26 after someone claiming to be
on the staff of Dr. Matthew Israel -- the psychologist who founded the
school -- called facility and ordered the treatments.

Two state legislators called on Gov. Deval Patrick to take quick
action to put strict regulations in place for the use of shock
therapy.

"In a word, this incident is horrifying and it would be immoral for
the Legislature and the executive branch not to react strongly and
swiftly," said Sen. Brian A. Joyce, who has previously sponsored
legislation to ban electric shock therapy.

Kenneth Mollins, a New York attorney who has filed several lawsuits
against the Rotenberg center alleging the mistreatment of children at
the Canton-based school, sent a letter Monday to Patrick and various
state agencies, calling on the state to investigate the complaints,
which were first reported by The Examiner newspaper, of Washington.

"The governor needs to take a look and see what's happening here.
There is nobody overseeing the store. If somebody can just call and
ask that somebody be shocked, there is a significant problem,"
Mollins said.

The center, believed to be the only school in the nation that uses a
two-second skin-shock punishment to change destructive behavior, is no
stranger to controversy. It has survived two attempts by the state to
close it amid allegations that its unorthodox methods amount to abuse.

Massachusetts was required to pay the center $580,000 after it
unsuccessfully sought to close the school following the 1985 death of
a 22-year-old student who suffered a seizure while restrained and
forced to listen to static noise.

More recently an investigation was ordered to determine if a shock
device malfunctioned, causing burns to one student. The center also
agreed to stop referring to staff members as psychologists if they
have not been licensed with the state.

On Monday, the center defended its use of the intensive treatment
methods, saying they are used in a minority of cases as part of
overall therapy for "very deeply emotionally disturbed young adults."

The procedures are applied "only after obtaining prior parental,
medical, psychiatric, human rights, peer review and individual
approval from a Massachusetts Probate Court," Corrigan said.