End nightmare of institutional child abuse

Hold the ‘ troubled teen’ industry accountable

In my 2020 documentary, “This Is Paris,” I revealed a secret I had kept for more than 20 years: When I was 16, I was taken from my home in the middle of the night and spent almost two years at a series of residential treatment facilities. My parents had been conned into believing that my diagnosed attention deficit disorder behavior would be fixed with “tough love.”

I’m still processing the trauma, doing the hard work it takes to tell the whole story in a memoir that will be published next year. It takes all my courage to talk about it, but I couldn’t stand knowing that children as young as 8 are being sent to these “troubled teen” programs by parents who don’t know and government agencies that don’t care.

Late night internal exams

The last stop on my terrible journey was Provo Canyon School, a lockdown facility where I was sent after I escaped from a couple boot- camp type places. On my first day, I was forced to remove all my clothes, squat and cough, and submit to a gynecological exam – all watched closely by male staff.

Although it was an extremely uncomfortable experience, I was led to believe it was a legitimate, routine check for contraband. But what I couldn’t understand as a 16- year- old girl was why that internal exam would be done to me frequently during my time at Provo, and only during the middle of the night.

I was repeatedly awakened by staff shining a bright flashlight in my face, pulled out of bed and told to be quiet as I was ushered down my dorm’s hallway to an “exam room.” Sleep- deprived and heavily medicated, I didn’t understand what was happening. I was forced to lie on a padded table, spread my legs and submit to gynecological exams. I remember crying while they held me down. I kept saying, “No!” and asking, “Why?” They just said, “Shut up. Be quiet. Stop struggling or you’ll go to Obs.”

Obs – short for observation – was solitary confinement in a tiny cinderblock room with nothing but a drain and a roll of toilet paper. The room was freezing cold, and I was almost naked. I paced until I couldn’t stand up anymore. Then I huddled on the floor and rocked back and forth, forcing myself to think about the life I would create for myself after I got out.

So many kids around me were just gone. No hope. No light.

This was especially true for girls who got dragged to those sham medical exams and the ones whom adult male staff leered at as we showered. If we tried to protest or question anything, they said it was a bad dream. They told us to stop making things up. But looking back on these experiences as an adult woman, I can recognize these exams for what they were: the sexual assault of children.

That experience, and the physical, emotional, and sexual abuse I suffered, led to years of trauma- induced insomnia and complex post- traumatic stress disorder that I and countless other survivors of institutional child abuse have struggled with for years.

This isn’t treatment; it’s torture

The troubled teen industry has been allowed to thrive without transparency or accountability for decades, raking in tens of billions of dollars while preying on vulnerable families.

Private equity firms are increasingly investing. Medicaid, special education and Title IV- E funding for foster kids continues to flow.

Our tax dollars help pay for more than 120,000 youth pipelined each year into these facilities, even though studies have confirmed widespread abuses and fatalities.

Fourteen years ago, members of Congress heard testimony from federal investigators who found that “staff hogtied and shackled youth to poles in public places, and girls were forced to eat their own vomit if they threw up while exercising in the hot sun.

“Staff routinely broke and wired shut the jaws of youth who showed disrespect in another facility. … Youth were sexually assaulted and threatened with sexual assault by other youth in some facilities, all without effective intervention from management.”

Anyone can recognize this isn’t treatment; it’s torture.

Institutional abuse survivors are on Capitol Hill this week to continue educating lawmakers about how badly children placed in the troubled teen industry are treated. We will continue to make our voices heard to rally national support in this important election year to urge Congress to finally stop institutional child abuse.

We all need to make it clear that Americans expect bipartisan leadership and cooperation to address this tragically overlooked children’s human rights crisis immediately. Further inaction is inexcusable.

Looking back on these experiences as an adult woman, I can recognize these exams for what they were: the sexual assault of children.

RICK BOWMER/ AP Hilton leads a protest in 2020 in Provo, Utah. Hilton in her late teens was sent to Provo Canyon School where, she says, she was abused mentally and physically.

LEAH HOGSTEN/ AP Paris Hilton has spoken out about the abuse she said she experienced as a teenager at Provo Canyon School.