Reports of possible abuse have reached us. The Lundsberg elite boarding school became noticed in the media because a boy was rushed to the hospital with severe burns after an introduction event at the school.

The school – founded in 1896 – has a number of prominent students among its alumnis. Members of the royal family have been students there as well as a number of diplomats and politicians.

Former students speak of the use of corporal punishment among the students. It seems that the students are required to keep a kind of informal standard where older students put younger students into place if they act out.

• Among the incidents are nightly raids in the dorms conducted by senior students, so newcomers were beaten.
  
• Newcomers were forced to have a broom-stick with a condom put up in private parts.
• Rule breakers were required to receive electrical shocks with an electric fly swatter on more sensitive parts of their body.
• Newcomers were spoken of in degrading language like slaves.

It is a degree of bullying which the official Sweden would disapprove of. In fact Sweden was among the first school to create a strategy against bullying in public schools. It is odd and very shocking that department of education in Sweden has not shut the school down.

They need to do that to show that they take bullying seriously. Nothing would do it.


Sources: (In Swedish language)

• ’Vi blev slagna hela tiden’ (Aftonbladet)
• Veckans kris: Lundsberg internatskola (Svenska Institutet for Kriskommunikation)

A 19 year old woman committed suicide due to the depression over a massage she felt became to intimate.

The facility was for young people suffering from various abuse problems. During her enrollement she was "offered" massage from one of the male staff members.

She claimed that she became afraid over the incident but no additional supervision was imposed once she told the medical staff about the incident.

She hang herself in the shower. Suicide by hanging at such facilities are not that uncommon. If we look across the ocean two very high profile cases did happen at Spring Creek Lodge featured in CNN in a television program about the narcotic drug known as Meth. Also at Island View, which is a high profile residential treatment facility in Utah owned by one of the largest companies in the rehab business (Aspen Education Group) saw a suicide committed in the shower.

The problem is very much the quality of the staff. There must be rules which disallowed staff to handle residents on their own when the clothing is removed. The staff involved in such incident should be of the same gender as the resident.

But it always comes down to money. It might never be perfect.

References:
Nya Skandaler på behanlingshem (Expressen.se)
Spring Creek Lodge (WWASPinfo)
Teen Facility targets suicide prevention (Deseret News)