Vermont Education Secretary Dan French has asked the State Board of Education to launch a review of Kurn Hattin Homes for Children, a residential private school in Westminster facing sexual abuse allegations that span several decades.
The State Board has the power to grant approval for private schools to operate in the state, and can review and rescind that approval if certain red flags appear.
In September, Kurn Hattin relinquished its license from the Department for Children and Families to operate a residential treatment program, following a state investigation of sexual misconduct and abuse allegations at the school.
An investigative report from DCF in 2019 describes a “touching club,” in which at least nine boys who were residents of Kurn Hattin “had been engaging in sexualized activity with each other.”
In addition to “the club,” DCF describes a series of incidents involving a girl who repeatedly assaulted two other girls at Kurn Hattin in 2018 and 2019 with a toothbrush in dorm showers, and another perpetrator who penetrated other girls’ vaginas with her fingers as part of what was described as “hazing.” Another girl in April 2019 was forced by a male classmate to have sex in a stairwell of the auditorium, state documents show.
Kurn Hattin failed to report the sexual abuse within 24 hours as mandated by law to DCF investigators. In some instances, the institution took months to notify authorities.
The school continues to operate under a license from the State Board to enroll students ages 5-15 in grades K-8, according to Agency of Education spokesperson Ted Fisher.
There are about 60 enrolled, he said, and one is a publicly-funded Vermont student.
In a letter to the State Board, French recommended that it undertake a review of the school’s approval, based on findings in a recent DCF licensing report that found the school hadn’t reported abuse allegations in a timely manner and hadn’t done the right background checks on employees.
“These particular findings of noncompliance with DCF regulations and relevant statutes may also represent noncompliance with laws and regulations that apply to approved independent schools,” he wrote.
The board had planned to vote Wednesday on whether to begin a review. But members instead spoke in executive session for about an hour “to discuss probable civil litigation to which the public body may be a party,” according to a motion made by board member Oliver Olsen.
When the board came back into public session, it said it was deferring the decision on a review until a special meeting.
In a brief statement, board chair John Carroll said the body took the secretary’s recommendation for a review “very seriously” but needed to seek independent counsel before moving forward, “so that our procedure is fair to all parties and all interests in the matter.”
“The arrival on the scene in the last three days of long letters from lawyers — with very different perspectives, of course — caused the board to feel that we wanted to be really, really scrupulous in our handling of the matter,” Carroll said in an interview after the meeting.
‘A delay of justice’
The board’s decision to defer action temporarily drew a sharp rebuke from Kim Dougherty, a Boston-based attorney who represents former students of Kurn Hattin who say they suffered physical, emotional and sexual abuse and assault while at the school.
Dougherty was given 5 minutes to speak, but in the middle of her remarks, she was cut off by Oliver Olsen, a member of the SBE. Olsen said she could bring up her concerns at a special meeting in the near future.
Dougherty urged the SBE to call a special meeting immediately.
“Delaying this vote is a delay of justice for the survivors and only continues to leave children in the homes of Kurn Hattin at risk. This is a very serious matter. It needs to be heard — immediately,” she told board members. “I can tell you the heartbreak that I’m going to hear from every single one of my clients when I have to tell them you deferred this vote. It is a shame.”
Dougherty’s law firm, Andrus Wagstaff PC, represented victims in a lawsuit against Michigan State University on behalf of gymnasts who were sexually abused by Larry Nassar, a team doctor. The firm is now preparing a mass action lawsuit against Kurn Hattin on behalf of former students, and over 30 plaintiffs have already signed on, according to Dougherty.
DCF commissioner Sean Brown has been emphatic that the department would have yanked the school’s treatment license had Kurn Hattin not voluntarily surrendered it. But school officials have nevertheless vehemently insisted they gave up their license of their own volition, and not because of regulatory pressure from the state.
“We told DCF more than a year ago that we chose to end our license with DCF because we are not a residential treatment program. We provide children with a year-round home and school; we don’t provide treatment,” school officials said in a letter submitted to the State Board.
In a nine-age letter also submitted to the board, Kurn Hattin’s attorney Gary Karnedy, a lawyer with Primmer Piper Eggleston & Cramer PC, the school also contested that it had failed to perform proper background checks and report abuse allegations in a timely manner. And Karnedy argued that the Agency of Education needed to conduct its own investigation, and not rely on DCF’s records, before moving forward.
“We appreciate the Vermont Board of Education’s thoughtful and measured approach today as it considered Secretary French’s request for a review of Kurn Hattin Homes. We will work collaboratively with the board as it proceeds with a fair and deliberative process,” Karnedy wrote in an email to VTDigger.
Kurn Hattin officials have acknowledged that abuse took place at the school many decades ago, and in July even announced they would launch their own investigation into the matter. But survivors and their attorneys argue the school has not truly accepted responsibility for its failings, and is ignoring much more recent incidents of abuse.
The problems at Kurn Hattin were detailed last month by VTDigger in an expose that described a culture of abuse alleged over an 80 year period. Survivors told of patterns of child molestion, brutal punishments and violence.
VTDigger also obtained documents from a 2019 state investigation that show at least nine children and possibly as many as 15, according to a parent, molested each other. In addition, there were significant threats of self-harm, violence or exploitation at the Westminster campus from 2015 to 2019. The school director’s own 15-year-old foster child solicited “inappropriate” images of a 12-year-old girl and a 13-year-old Kurn Hattin student, according to records provided by DCF.
Nine boys, ages 7 to 11, were involved in the “touching club” for at least a year, investigators found. The boys groped each other and engaged in oral contact, documents show. The “club” was started by a boy in 2015 to 2016 who had since graduated, a mother of one of the boys told VTDigger.
Anne Galloway contributed to this report.
Editor’s note: This story was updated at 6:20 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 22 with more information about the nature of the alleged abuse.
