Social:Teen escort company

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Short description: Company transporting minors to facilities

Template:KidnappingIn the United States, a teen escort company, also called a youth transport firm or secure transport company, is a business that specializes in transporting teenagers from their homes to various facilities in the troubled teen industry.[1][2] Such businesses typically employ a form of legal kidnapping, abducting sleeping teenagers and forcing them into a vehicle. Teen escort companies in the United States are subject to little or no government regulation and commonly result in permanent trauma.[3]

Methodology

Teen escort companies regularly employ the practice of gooning, a form of legal kidnapping occurring predominantly in the United States, in which parents hire rehabilitation organizations to seize children they perceive as troubled and transport them to boot camps, behavior modification facilities, residential treatment centers, substance abuse treatment facilities, wilderness therapy, or therapeutic boarding school.[4][5][6] In most cases, the organizations send a group of people to show up by surprise and force the teenager into a vehicle.[7]

Children to be transported are often picked up during the middle of the night to take advantage of their initial disorientation and to minimize confrontation and flight risk. Aggressive tactics, such as being assaulted, restrained with handcuffs, or hogtied with cable wires, are common.[4][8][9] Children are sometimes picked up at school, with the school staff unaware of the escort company's employees' true intentions.[10]Template:Pg

Children who resist are frequently threatened, restrained with handcuffs or zip ties, blindfolded, or hooded.[7] Children who have been gooned frequently report post traumatic stress disorder, problems sleeping at night, and recurring nightmares into adulthood.[4] Paris Hilton's documentary This Is Paris details her experience at age 17 with gooning, culminating in her transport to Provo Canyon School where she was abused.[11][12]

United States

As a transport option, parents in the United States are able to hire teen escort companies to transport their children from their homes to residential treatment centers (RTCs) and other facilities in the troubled teen industry.[13][14] These facilities go by many names, and include private religious re-education facilities,[15][16] teen residential programs, wilderness therapy programs, therapeutic boarding schools, boot camps, or behavior modification programs.[17]

In 2004, it was estimated that there were more than twenty teen escort companies operating in the United States.[17][18] Parents may use this type of service when they believe their child needs treatment outside the home, but are unable or unwilling to travel there.[19] The service can cost $5,000 to $8,000 U.S. dollars (up to $10,500 in 2024).[4] Many teen escort companies do not have any training or background requirements for prospective employees.[10]Template:Pg

The use of such services is controversial, because the services are subject to little or no government regulation[18][20][21][15] and because they are associated with treatment services which are themselves controversial. For teenagers seized in the middle of the night by strangers, being abducted by a teen escort company may result in permanent trauma.[15]

Supporters—including many clinicians and parent advocates—argue that when lower-intensity services have failed and risk of harm or elopement is high, planned professional transport to a licensed residential program can be the least-risky way to complete admission.[22] Provider literature describes “clinical” or “therapeutic” transport models that emphasize de-escalation, consent-seeking where possible, advance safety planning, and family communication before, during, and after the handoff to the receiving facility.[23][24] This discussion sits within a wider U.S. youth mental-health crisis, in which residential treatment is recognized by major medical bodies as part of a continuum of care for adolescents who cannot be safely treated in the community; outcomes vary by program quality and aftercare, but multiple reviews report clinically meaningful improvement for many youth.[25][26][27] Some U.S. jurisdictions have also begun to regulate aspects of youth transport and residential placement to increase oversight and safety standards (for example, Utah requires youth transportation companies to register with the Office of Licensing, carry liability insurance, and submit staff for background checks).[28][29][30]

Films and television

  • Boot Camp (2008)
  • Coldwater (2013)
  • Self Medicated (2005)
  • Wayward (miniseries) (2025)

References

  1. ↑ Telep, Trisha (April 22, 2014). "The man who takes troubled youths to therapy camp". BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26513805. 
  2. ↑ Miller, Jessica; Fuchs, David; Craft, Will (March 8, 2022). "'Blindfolds, hoods and handcuffs': How some teenagers come to Utah youth treatment programs" (in en-US). Salt Lake Tribune. ISSN 0746-3502. https://www.sltrib.com/news/2022/03/08/blindfolds-hoods/. ""A lot of those Utah-bound kids arrive through a "secure transport" company, where parents pay thousands of dollars to have someone pick up their child and take them away."" 
  3. ↑ Evans, Rachelle (13 March 2024). "Gooning is clearly the wrong choice for our children". The Michigan Daily. https://www.michigandaily.com/opinion/gooning-is-clearly-the-wrong-choice-for-our-children/. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Solomon, Serena (November 30, 2016). "The Legal Industry for Kidnapping Teens". https://www.vice.com/en/article/the-legal-industry-for-kidnapping-teens/. 
  5. ↑ Anderson, Sulome (August 12, 2014). "When Wilderness Boot Camps Take Tough Love Too Far" (in en). https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/08/when-wilderness-boot-camps-take-tough-love-too-far/375582/. 
  6. ↑ "The Troubled Teen Industry's Troubling Lack of Oversight" (in en). https://www.law.upenn.edu/live/news/15963-the-troubled-teen-industrys-troubling-lack-of. ""Teens may be subject to legally and ethically dubious tactics before they ever step foot on the grounds of the RTF, with the advent of an industry practice dubbed "gooning" by which youth are placed into these facilities against their will. Some parents hire transport services to stage kidnappings of their children, violently extracting teens from their homes in the middle of the night and delivering them to RTFs thousands of miles away"" 
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Salter, Jim (September 27, 2022). "Rules sought for 'gooning,' taking troubled kids to care". https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/rules-sought-gooning-taking-troubled-kids-care-90567104. 
  8. ↑ Bauer, Laura; Thomas, Judy (September 5, 2022). "'Literally kidnapping': Teens taken against their will to boarding schools across US". https://www.kansascity.com/news/state/missouri/article265246901.html. 
  9. ↑ Ortiz, Michelle Ray (June 13, 1999). "'Escort Service' or Legalized Abduction?" (in en-US). https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-jun-13-me-46067-story.html. 
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 Robbins, Ira P. (14 June 2014). "Kidnapping Incorporated: The Unregulated Youth-Transportation Industry and the Potential for Abuse" (PDF). American Criminal Law Review 51 (563): 563–600. https://works.bepress.com/ira_robbins/22/download/. Retrieved 7 March 2025. 
  11. ↑ Goldsmith, Annie (August 24, 2020). "Paris Hilton Opens Up About Physical and Emotional Abuse at Boarding School" (in en-US). Town & Country. https://www.townandcountrymag.com/leisure/arts-and-culture/a30632510/paris-hilton-this-is-paris-documentary/. Retrieved September 23, 2020. 
  12. ↑ Hilton, Paris (August 14, 2023). "Paris Hilton: my boarding school hell and how I survived" (in en). The Times. ISSN 0140-0460. https://www.thetimes.com/article/paris-hilton-memoir-extract-provo-canyon-abuse-2023-pjhps5qkv. ""Mom cooked. No one acted angry or odd or nervous. I was sound asleep at about 4.30 in the morning when my bedroom door crashed open. A thick hand grabbed my ankle and dragged me off the mattress. I was instantly awake."" 
  13. ↑ Okoren, Nicolle (November 14, 2022). "The wilderness 'therapy' that teens say feels like abuse: 'You are on guard at all times'" (in en). The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/nov/14/us-wilderness-therapy-camps-troubled-teen-industry-abuse. 
  14. ↑ Ingram, Sarah (March 26, 2023). "Kidnapped and taken into the woods: 'Why I had my teen gooned'" (in en). Metro. https://metro.co.uk/2023/03/26/kidnapped-and-taken-into-the-woods-why-i-had-my-teen-gooned-18496322/. 
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 15.2 "Dangers of Teen Escort Transportation Services". http://astartforteens.org/teen-escort-transport-may-cause-lifelong-trauma. 
  16. ↑ Touretzky, Dave (Jan 23, 2016). "The Lisa McPherson Clause". https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Scientology/ReleaseForms/Introspection.html. 
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Pinto, Allison; Friedman, Robert M.; Epstein, Monica (September 28, 2005). "The Exploitation of Youth and Families in the Name of "Specialty Schooling:" What Counts as Sufficient Data? What are Psychologists to Do?". CYF Newsletter (Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida: American Psychological Association) Summer 2005. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237667099.  Full text
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 "Residential Treatment Programs for Teens Consumer Information". July 2008. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0185-residential-treatment-programs-teens. 
  19. ↑ Stein, Samantha (April 8, 2019). "Why I Kidnapped My Daughter". https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/what-the-wild-things-are/201904/why-i-kidnapped-my-daughter. 
  20. ↑ Labi, Nadya. "Want your kid to disappear?". http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/July-August-2004/feature_labi_julaug04.msp. 
  21. ↑ "Journalism Center Awards: Nadya Labi". http://www.journalismcenter.org/awards/nadya_labi.html. 
  22. ↑ "Policy Statement on Youth Access to Residential Treatment Facilities". American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. April 22, 2025. https://www.aacap.org/aacap/policy_statements/2025/Youth_Access_Residential_Treatment_Facilities.aspx. 
  23. ↑ "Clinical Treatment Transport". Interactive Youth Transport. https://www.interactiveyouthtransport.com/blog/clinical-treatment-transport. 
  24. ↑ "Therapeutic Openings & Teen Crisis Intervention". Interactive Youth Transport. https://www.interactiveyouthtransport.com/blog/therapeutic-openings-teen-crisis-intervention. 
  25. ↑ "Protecting Youth Mental Health: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory". December 6, 2021. https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-youth-mental-health-advisory.pdf. 
  26. ↑ "Outcomes for children and adolescents after residential treatment: a review of research from 1993 to 2003". Centre for Reviews and Dissemination. 2005. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK71639/. 
  27. ↑ Peckmezian, T.; Paxton, S.J. (2020). "A systematic review of outcomes following residential treatment for eating disorders". Journal of Eating Disorders 8: 1–16. PMC 7216912. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7216912/. 
  28. ↑ "Utah SB 239 (2022): Congregate Care Program Amendments". 2022. https://le.utah.gov/~2022/bills/sbillenr/SB0239.htm. 
  29. ↑ "26B-2-125. Youth transportation company registration". May 3, 2023. https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title26B/Chapter2/26B-2-S125.html. 
  30. ↑ "Human Services—Youth Transportation Companies". https://dlbc.utah.gov/home/office-of-licensing/human-services/youth-transportation-companies/. 

Further reading

  • Magnuson, Doug; Dobud, Will; Harper, Nevin J. (2024). "Can Involuntary Youth Transport into Outdoor Behavioral Healthcare Treatment Programs (Wilderness Therapy) Ever Be Ethical?". Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal 41 (3): 417–425. doi:10.1007/s10560-022-00864-2. 

Template:Troubled teen industry



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