Jessica Miller | Salt Lake Tribune
ReporterJessica Miller is a legal affairs and criminal justice for The Salt Lake Tribune, where she has worked since 2011. Her reporting has earned numerous awards, including a Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting in 2017. Jessica can be reached at jmiller@sltrib.com.
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Legislators passed a bill last year that brought the first regulatory reform to teen treatment programs in 15 years. -
Some 20,000 kids have been sent away to Utah teen treatment programs since 2015.
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Utah's Office of Licensing recently confirmed that it is planning to release violation and disciplinary information online, accessible through a search on its website.
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Vista is one of the more than 100 teen treatment programs in Utah, which cater to parents and out-of-state agencies who care for struggling teenagers.
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Opening a youth treatment center is relatively simple in Utah. But state regulators often can't — or won't — shut a place down after abuse is alleged.
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Inappropriate contact between children and staff members has happened with some frequency in Utah’s teen treatment programs. From November 2018 through July 2021 — state regulators have investigated at least 20 reports of staff pushing the boundaries with clients, sometimes amounting to sexual abuse.
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With a parent’s consent, two people are sent to surprise their child while they are asleep to forcefully take them to a wilderness program or residential treatment center.
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One facility is being sued after a staffer broke a boy’s wrist, while another has been disciplined by the state for similar tactics.
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Federal regulations would impact the more than 100 teen treatment facilities in Utah, which plays an outsized role in the industry.
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In 2019, a girl from Bermuda died by suicide at West Ridge Academy, a teen treatment facility in West Jordan. The Salt Lake Tribune reports her parents filed a lawsuit against the facility last month. The litigation comes as a new state law requires centers to develop suicide prevention policies.
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A staffer at West Ridge Academy, a Utah facility for “troubled teens,” is facing a child abuse charge after prosecutors say he fractured a teen’s wrist during a restraint.
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The Office of Licensing is crafting new rules after legislators passed a bill that brings more state oversight for the first time in 15 years.
