Missouri AG says new abuse allegations at Agape school are ‘immediate’ safety concern

Current students at Agape Boarding School told Missouri child welfare workers in recent days about extensive ongoing abuse they said boys are enduring, according to a proposed petition included in a court motion filed Monday.

One boy was handcuffed for two weeks, students told the Children’s Division employees. Another ended up with his arm in a sling, students said, from an overzealous restraint. And yet another lost so much weight after being demoted to “Brown Town” — a designation given to the lowest level at Agape, where manual labor is required and meals are reduced — that he reportedly resorted to stealing food to keep from starving.

Those revelations were attached to a motion filed Monday by the Missouri attorney general in an effort to provide the court with additional information in a quest to shut down the Cedar County school near Stockton. Much of the information in the proposed amended petition comes from interviews with nearly a dozen current students who approached Children’s Division employees while they were at the school monitoring for safety.

“As soon as the office received new evidence that further proves that there is an immediate health or safety concern for the students at Agape Boarding School, we have filed a Motion for Leave to file a Second Amended Petition that details that new evidence,” said Chris Nuelle, spokesman for the AG’s office. “Our fight to protect the students at Agape Boarding School continues on.”

According to a Missouri Supreme Court rule, the Attorney General’s Office and the Department of Social Services were required to file the motion with the court in order to get permission to amend their petition a second time.

Many men who attended the school in their youth and have spoken with The Star over the past two years said they were subjected to physical restraints, extreme workouts, long days of manual labor, and food and water withheld as punishment. And, they said, students suffered constant berating and mind games, and some were physically and sexually abused by staff and other youth.

In court last week, Judge David Munton refused to let a former student testify because the teen left the school in July 2021. Munton said he needed to hear evidence of current abuse, not incidents from the past.

According to the proposed amended petition, “these new developments are sadly consistent with the dark pattern of behavior at Agape previously exposed by the Attorney General’s Office and DSS...”

The new information describes numerous examples of abuse reported to Children’s Division employees who have been placed at the school over the past 10 days to ensure students’ safety. Among the examples that students — who were identified in the proposed petition by their initials — reported to the child welfare workers:

▪ Multiple boys were placed in handcuffs with hands behind their backs, some for days and others longer, students said. One boy’s hands were “blue and bloodied” when the cuffs were removed after 100 hours. Another student, who refused to do jumping jacks, was punched in the stomach by a staffer while other staff members held him, then was placed in handcuffs for about two weeks, Children’s Division employees were told. He was forced to sleep in the handcuffs, and they were only removed so he could go to the bathroom.

▪ A current staffer picked up a student “and slammed him through a door that was magnetically locked, then restrained (the student) on the ground for about 40 minutes, according to independent accounts by five students. By all accounts, the document said, the student was hurt from the incident.

▪ Another current staffer restrained several students to the point of causing large bruising, loss of feeling in arms, legs and fingers and severe swelling. One student “was diagnosed with ulnar nerve neuropathy, which is consistent with physical abuse,” the proposed petition said.

▪ Another student was running as discipline and when he couldn’t keep going, a current staff member threw him against the wall and applied pressure to his shoulder, then lifted him in the air and slammed him on the ground, child welfare workers were told. The staffer then landed on the student’s shoulder and pressed his elbow into it. Days later, the student received medical care, and the shoulder injury required his arm to be in a sling for three months, according to the allegations.

“The sheer number of staff whose conduct toward residents has directly raised immediate concerns regarding the health and safety of the children at Agape and may constitute child abuse or neglect, including physical and emotional abuse, is remarkable,” the proposed amended petition said.

Some of the most egregious examples of alleged abuse were attributed to “Current Staff Member 5,” who the document said “directs the facility, is intimately familiar with its structure and operation, participates in the management, and was fully aware of and condoned, if not promoted, Brown Town.”

That staffer grabbed one student’s hair, it said, and “slammed his head onto the tile floor multiple times.” As the student was restrained by other staff members, “Current Staff Member 5 then put his knee on (the boy’s) head and into (his) arms.”

The proposed amended petition said the boy’s ear “swelled two to three times its normal size and puss oozed from the back of his ear.” He also suffered “heavy bruising to his arms and a loss of feeling and numbness in his fingers and right hand for weeks afterwards.”

According to the new proposed petition, current students repeatedly expressed fear to Children’s Division employees that they would be retaliated against for speaking with them. They feared they would be demoted to “Brown Town” and not allowed to contact their parents.

One student, the new information said, wrote reminder notes for his meeting with the Children’s Division workers but was so afraid he’d get in trouble that he hid his notes in his shoe in case he was searched by Agape staffers.

The proposed petition also said that Agape has continued to employ staff members “who have exhibited conduct toward residents that may rise to the level of child abuse or neglect.”

“Absent relief from this court, once DSS staff are no longer in the facility, the conduct previously exhibited by current staff at Agape directly raises immediate concerns, and there exists an immediate concern for the health and safety of the children at Agape,” it said.

The new information provided to investigators “continues to describe a pattern of conduct occurring at Agape that raises immediate concerns for the health and safety of the children at Agape and may rise to the level of child abuse or neglect,” the proposed petition said. “But for DSS employees currently present 24 hours a day at the facility, the Attorney General and DSS believe that this conduct would be occurring now and that the conduct will return as soon as DSS employees are no longer in the facility to ensure safety.”

The motion for leave filed Monday said that Children’s Division workers had been at Agape since Sept. 8.

“During the past week, numerous current Agape students have proactively approached the Children’s Division workers, often surreptitiously, and requested to speak with them,” it said. “DSS staff took appropriate action for the students to be interviewed. In these interviews, the students reported physical abuse by current Agape employees at times before the Children’s Division workers were present.”

The motion said current students “also have thanked Children’s Division workers for their presence at Agape because the Agape employees have not physically or verbally abused the students while the workers have been present.”

According to the motion, DSS has reviewed each name that Agape provided on a Sept. 8 employee roster and found that multiple employees on the list have not completed background checks as required by a new state law.

Failure to do so, the motion said, is grounds “to cease the operation of Agape and provide for the appropriate removal of the children there.”

DSS also has learned that the school employs others whose names were not provided on the Sept. 8 roster, the motion said.

“Without knowing all employees who have been omitted from the September 8, 2022 roster, it is unknown how many employees have failed to comply with background checks, and who may present immediate health and safety concerns due to their proximity to children,” it said.

On Sept. 7, the AG’s office and DSS filed a petition in Cedar County Circuit Court asking for an injunction to immediately close Agape and remove students, citing concerns about their safety. The petition stated that on that day, DSS had added a current Agape staff member to the state’s Central Registry after the agency found by a preponderance of evidence that the staffer had committed child abuse at Agape.

Munton signed the order that night to immediately close the school and remove students. But by the next morning, he put that on hold and sent Cedar County Sheriff James “Jimbob” McCrary to Agape to determine whether the staff member was still working there. Missouri law prohibits someone from working at a residential care facility if the person has a substantiated finding of child abuse or neglect or is placed on the Central Registry.

Agape director Bryan Clemensen told McCrary that the staffer had been fired the previous day but still lived on the property. Munton scheduled a hearing for last Monday and ordered that DSS workers could be on the campus around the clock to make sure students were safe.

DSS officials confirmed earlier this month that its investigators have substantiated 11 findings related to the school. In addition, three Agape employees — including Clemensen and medical coordinator Scott Dumar — have had reports substantiated against them, The Star has learned. But they’ve appealed those findings and state law allows them to work at the school during the appeals process.

Dumar also is one of five staff members charged last year with physical abuse of students.