by Michael McIntosh
Good Afternoon, My name is Michael McIntosh. I am the
parent of a youth that was attacked, critically injured and then hidden in the
system, to keep the incident quiet.
Imagine this…
On a normal visitation day, I was told by the Walnut Grove
(WG) staff that my son, who had been there for 3 months, was no longer at the
facility. Walnut Grove is a private juvenile detention center operated by
the GEO Group for the Mississippi Department of Corrections. When I reached out
for more information of where my son was, they consistently denied knowledge of
his whereabouts. How could a child placed in the custody of the MDOC
disappear? After not getting any assistance from WG staff, I was referred
to the Warden, who refused to tell me about my son’s whereabouts. After 2 1/2
weeks of MDOC and WG passing the buck back and forth and playing games, I took
matters in my own hands and started my own investigation. I realized that they
did not care about the well being of my son, nor did they care about me knowing
his status. I found out that my son was in the hospital, but no status
information was given. I called MDOC and asked the medical department about my
son’s status to which I received no response. A few days later, an MDOC
chaplain called to help me with visitation to my son. After 5 1/2 weeks of
searching, visitation was granted to me to see my son, but they had moved him
to another facility. A new visitation order was granted for a two-hour visit,
in which I was only able to spend a half hour with my son. The reason this
happened is because I questioned the head nurse about the status of my son;
because of her attitude, she called security and told them she felt threatened
and needed assistance. Security came to assist her, but it was not the 24-hour
security that was already in his room, but rather hospital security. The
security officer told me I had to leave, that visitation was over. Keep in mind
that this was more than a month after the incident. The next day I called the
chaplain back, explained what happened and asked for another visitation with my
son. On Friday of the following week the head doctor of MDOC called and I was
told no further visitation will be granted and the visitation that I was
granted was done as a favor to me. I was forced to wait until my son was
granted visitation rights by MDOC. My son was transferred to Parchman hospital
where he received no medical treatment. After four to six weeks, he was
released from the Parchman hospital, and he was transferred to a drug and
alcohol facility at Parchman though he does not have a problem with either. He
has yet to receive treatment that addresses his injuries even though many
request have been made for treatment. He is an underage inmate at Parchman, put
there and left there so that this incident would not be known. My son had been
assaulted in a riot at the Walnut Grove YCF in which he received brain damage,
but has still not received proper medical treatment for what he experienced.