When Does Physical Restraint Become Abuse?
The tale of an autistic student in Massachusetts shows the issues that come with restraint practices
Most children who get hurt at school can tell their parents what happened, but what about those who cannot? Twelve-year-old Carmen Maggiore is autistic and cannot communicate verbally, so when his mother, Linda Auger, noticed deep purple bruises on her son's arms and abrasions on his upper chest, lower back, and buttocks, she couldn't ask him to tell her what happened. Auger, who lives in Braintree, Mass., believes her son suffered what many parents dread: abuse at the hands of his former teacher, an adult Auger trusted with Carmen's well-being and education. The teacher has said no such abuse took place. It's an example of the difficult circumstances that parents and schools face when trying to sort out whether abuse occurred in a classroom.
Records maintained by the South Shore Educational Collaborative, a Massachusetts day school for children with special needs that Carmen attended, show that the teacher, who could not be reached for comment, physically restrained Carmen for disciplinary reasons about once a week over a three-month period in early 2008, events Auger believes caused her son's strange injuries. With special-needs children, restraint is sometimes acceptable, and there is a fine line between proper restraint and abuse. Restraint is a widely accepted response to an emergency situation—such as when a student threatens to run into dangerous highway traffic or expresses the intent to assault a classmate. However, some educators use such techniques regularly as a means to modify seemingly harmless student behavior, blurring the line between necessary restraint and abusive restraint. "A review of the history of [restraint and seclusion] indicates that these procedures are prone to misapplication and abuse, placing students at equal or more risk than their problem behavior," wrote Robert Horner and George Sugai, directors of the Department of Education's office responsible for student behavior interventions. In Carmen's case, his former teacher and former classroom aides have divergent views about whether his teacher's use of restraint was warranted. Mary Ericson, one of the teacher's classroom aides, told police that in one instance, the teacher gripped Carmen's head, lifted him off the ground, and restrained the 4-foot, 60-pound boy over a desk. Carmen's offense, according to Ericson's statement, was pinching the teacher after becoming frustrated by her instruction to break one of his classroom routines, a task that can be difficult for a child like Carmen, who also suffers from an obsessive compulsive disorder.
Ericson and two other teacher aides reported what they say was "abuse" witnessed in Carmen's classroom to officials at the school and the Massachusetts Department of Social Services, according to an investigative action report written by the Randolph Police Department. But when the police department represented Carmen and his classmates at a hearing last fall, the court found there was insufficient evidence to warrant criminal charges against the teacher. The court cited inconsistencies in the aides' testimony along with overwhelmingly positive testimony about the accused teacher from her colleagues at the day school, men and women who praised her both as a teacher and as a person. Concerns for her son's safety unassuaged, Auger removed Carmen from the school, and other parents did the same. The teacher continues to work with special-needs students in Massachusetts but now teaches at the middle school level. Because Carmen and his classmates could not speak for themselves and weigh in on what took place in their classroom, their parents may never really know what happened to the students at school. Auger hopes for a law requiring schools to install surveillance cameras in all classrooms where teachers work with nonverbal autistic students, a practice that could offer some objective answers when parents ask, "What happened?" But on the state level, very few if any laws include provisions about cameras.
Auger and other opponents of restraint practices have found some support at the federal level: Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is taking their concerns seriously. Late last week, Duncan followed through on a resolution he made while testifying before the House Education and Labor Committee in May to investigate school districts' use of physical restraint techniques. He sent a letter to every state school chief asking them formally to submit their state's policies on the use of restraint in the classroom. Committee Chairman George Miller, a Democrat representing parts of northern California, pledged legislation that would protect students from abusive restraint techniques by summer's end, though no proposed bills have been made public yet.
Reader Comments
abusive restraints
My then 12 year old son with Asperger's syndrome was repeatedly thrown into multiple person prone restraints by his upstate NY public middle school staff members. Impartial Educational hearing officer wrote in her decision that my son had been subjected to at least 10 such restraints by untrained individuals for inappropriate antecedents over a four month period of time. She further wrote the evidence showed my son had been endangered and had suffered psychological and emotional harm from the restraints.
The special education teacher wrote, in one instance, that she layed over my son's back and a counselor had his legs and that he was restrained in such manner for approximately five minutes until he "fell asleep". The teacher did call parent after that particular restraint to inform the child's mother her son had fallen asleep and would not awaken. She neglected to mention he had "fallen asleep during the prone restraint".
My son did not "fall asleep". I doubt he fainted, as he had never fainted in his life and had not fainted during a twenty minute continuous prone restraint or during an off and on prone restraint of "approximately one hour".........restraints which school staff failed to inform parents of. I think it much more likely he went unconscious due to asphyxiation from an inherently dangerous prone restraint with the added risk of an adult lying over his back.
My son was never restrained for safety. He was restrained for punishment or for inept attempts at behavior modification.
In one instance he was thrown into a prone restraint by multiple adults for refusing to follow a directive to sit on center of a padded mat. For this infraction, he was restrained until he was "calm" (exhausted?). After such restraint, he began to bite his leg. He was ordered to stop biting his leg (no bite marks; non injurious self-stimulating behavior reactionary to immediately prior restraint.) so he was again thrown in another prone restraint until "calm" (exhausted?).
My son has post traumatic stress issues from this. He is a changed forever individual.
School staff acknowledged the behavior of concern for which my son was subjected to the vile restraints was stemming from his social deficits; however, none of these staff members would support any type of summer program to address the Asperger's related communication, social and behavioral deficits.
The Educational Law Administrative Hearing Officer opined "these same unrepentant individuals are capable of repetition"..........The school denied it had done any type of prone restraint which restrainers admitted to greater than one year later in the educational hearing.
At my son's school, a teacher was immediately suspended for punching a "neurotypical" student. There has been no accountability for the restrainers who nearly killed my child and who did endanger him and cause psychological and emotional harm as they ignored their CPI training and employed the multiple prone restraints.
Restraint
Having been a psychiatric nurse for 20 years and the mother of child with an ASD, this topic confounds me. I have restrained more people than I would like to admit. However it was always a last resort when all other interventions were ineffective. It was always as a protective mechanisn-danger to self or ohers. It was always under one-to-one constant supervision. It was always documnted. It was always supervisory and peer reviewed. It was always by professionsls trained in physical restraint. It was always concidered crisis intervention and not a behavior management tool. Any injury associated with a restraint was documented as an incident report. Restraints required a doctors order. Any attempt to restrain a patient without a coctors order is patient abuse, clear and sinple. All restraints are post-processed, meaning, the staff who restrained the individual reviewed their behavior to determine if there was any alternative to the restaint they may have missed, any injury caused to the patient because of their action, any way to make the restrain safer for the staff and the patient.
Restraint documenttion is always reviewed by external agencies,the state and the city for appropriateness. I amd amazd by some of the teacher remarks. Clearly they are untrained, unregulated and unsupported. That is dangerous. Restraint is not about domination, it is about protection.
A voice unheard
As an advocate for special needs for many years I have seen and reported many incidents to DMR and DPPC in Msassachusetts . It's sad to say that in all cases they were "unfounded". I would like someone to take an average of the incidents reported and how many were so called "unfounded" and I bet people would be astounded at the outcome! I find it disgraceful that these individuals without a voice are not being heard by the people that set the policies and procedures and yes I do blame the investigators,their departments and the courts. They should be ashamed of themselves for not beleiving the very people who are working with and caring for these individuals. I commend the aids and caretakers for standing up to these teachers/instructors and with the knowledge of knowing they are putiing their jobs in jeopardy. Why would someone lie about something this serious as assaulting a developmentally disabled person? what would they get out of it?? I just dont get it. I know I can sleep at night knowing I did everything in my power to protect these individuals but can these people that stamp the file UNFOUNDED? Maybe they should be the ones being investigated!
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