The sordid history of this State of Florida institution has been in the news again and again. The story of the Dozier School for Boys was detailed in a DKos diary on Jan 11, 2012 by floridagal called Florida in 2011: "Hell's 1400 acres" closed after 100 years. Article from 1968 detailing abuse.
TRIGGER WARNING FOR THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN ABUSED AND MAY FIND THE LINKS TO BE UPSETTING.
The wonderful floridagal posted her diary on Dozier 6 months after the "school" was closed in June 2011. Dozier had been in and out of the news for some years, since bones and graves just kept being found and investigations kept being ordered and nothing was ever done or resolved, just like nothing was done or resolved for many of the boys who were maliciously clapped into the Dozier School for Boys. They were subjected to severe punishment and torture in a building called The White House.
The living Alumni of the Dozier School for Boys have a Web site at http://www.officialwhitehouseboys.org/... which details their abuse and monstrous treatment by guards and fellow inmates. Please take some time to explore the site and marvel at the indifference of authorities over the decades.
The first of the later investigations into graves found:
12/10/08 http://voices.yahoo.com/...Dozier School for Boys Cemetery to Be Investigated by Florida Authorities White House Boys Recall Years of Abuse at Florida Reform SchoolThe latest good news is that Senator Bill Nelson D-FL and FL AG Pam Bondi are disputing the decision that digging be discontinued at the old school's cemetary and in other suspect area(s). At first it was 30 then 50 small graves, then the count rose to 98.Florida Governor Charlie Crist ordered the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate the allegations made by Roger Kiser and the other White House Boys. The Department of Juvenile Justice is cooperating but has no records that explain the existence of the cemetery at the reform school. One theory concerning who may be in the graves centers around the deaths of six boys after a 1914 fire, but that would account for only a few of the 30 or more graves at the Dozier School for Boys.
Marianna, Florida, is located about 70 miles northwest of Tallahassee[, Florida's state capital].
Erin Kimmerlee, a forensic anthropologist and University of South Florida associate professer was leading a team of USF anthropologists, biologists and archeologists exploring the Marianna facility.
The truth of what happened at one of the state's first reform schools may stay hidden forever. A permit to allow researchers to dig up suspected grave sites at the Dozier School for Boys has been rescinded.
The University of South Florida will appeal a ruling by the state that denied anthropologists and archaeologists a permit to exhume human remains on the campus of Florida's oldest reform school.
Funding for the dig was in place and Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner had originally issued a letter that would have allowed researchers at the University of South Florida to exhume what appear to be unidentified human remains at the former site of the Dozier School for Boys. However, Detzner now does not believe he had the authority to issue such an authorizing letter as it was not in accordance with formal instructions on treatment of the dead and buried.
From a fire in 1914 to shabby and incomplete record keeping ever since, actual written records on the "student" inmates of Dozier have been deemed incomplete and unreliable. The mystery of all the deceased boys has remained unexamined for 100+ years and, in light of these recent efforts by the state to keep whatever remains secret before the land is sold, the families of the boys may never be sure if, how or when their boys died.
Hopefully, USF will win its appeal, resume the dig and bring closure to those who have not been able to get over the fact that their child -- who was perhaps merely a truant -- never came home again from the Dozier School for Boys.
Many thanks to Senator Bill Nelson and Florida AG Pam Bondi for vowing to pursue justice for the dead and the living White House Boys.