July 21, 2006
Associated Press
(AP) ALLENTOWN, Pa. The mother of a 14-year-old boy who died after being restrained at a treatment facility will get $30,000 a year for 30 years in a settlement of her eight-year-old lawsuit.
Marsha Draheim of Pelican Island, N.J., sued over the Dec. 11, 1998, death of her son, Mark, who died of asphyxiation after being restrained by three counselors for 20 minutes.
His death at the KidsPeace treatment facility in North Whitehall Township, the second such death at the facility in five years, helped spur a national debate about the use of restraints on institutionalized children.
Marsha Draheim’s lawsuit accused counselors at the facility, which treated youths with behavioral and emotional problems, of having caused her son’s death. A prosecutor declined to file criminal charges, saying he could not prove recklessness or negligence.
In 1993, Jason Tallman, 12, of Barnegat, N.J., died at the facility after being restrained.
KidsPeace does not admit any wrongdoing or negligence in the settlement, which was approved in May by Lehigh County Senior Judge John P. Lavelle. KidsPeace spokesman Mark Stubis said the settlement “closes a sad chapter from eight years ago.”
Ralph J. Bellafatto, one of the mother’s lawyers, said organizations that provide child residential care “act as substitute parents in this situation, and their obligations are commensurate with that responsibility.”