CHARLESTON — Five more lawsuits have been filed against Miracle Meadows School alleging abuse by the school leaders and the church over the school.
Former students filed the lawsuits against Seventh-Day Adventist Church North American Division Inc.; Advent Home Learning Center Inc.; Susan Gayle Clark, the school's director; Blondel Senior, the director of the church and other defendants alleging educational malpractice, false imprisonment, bodily injury and invasion of privacy..
The plaintiffs alleged the boarding school was unsafe. The students claim they were forced to be confined in small, windowless rooms that didn't have proper hygiene or sanitation facilities, inadequate food or no food or drinks at all. They claim they suffered mistreatment, child abuse and child sex abuse during their times at the school.
One of the former students claims she was at the school for three years and suffered significant and continuous physical, sexual and/or emotional abuse and neglect during those three years.
"Numerous children at Miracle Meadows...were subjected to undernourishment, isolationism, corporal punishment, starvation and physical abuse as separate acts on separate occasions, as well as medical neglect," one of the complaints states.
The former students claim Senior, along with other staff members of both the church and the school, were aware of the abuse and neglect but chose to do nothing about the situation.
Students were forced into "quarantine" for punishment and would receive very little food, were handcuffed and duct-taped and were forced to either memorize Bible verses or write out entire chapters of the Bible without any mistakes or they would receive more time added to their quarantine sentences, according to one of the suits.
The former students are seeking compensatory and punitive damages with pre- and post-judgment interest. They are represented by R. Scott Long, Ashley N. Lynch and John K. Cecil of Hendrickson & Long; V. Paul Bucci II, Brian D. Kent and Gaetano D'Andrea of Laffey, Bucci & Kent; and W. Jesse Forbes of Forbes Law Office.
More than a dozen lawsuits have been filed against the boarding school in the last several years by other students who claimed they were mistreated.
Clark was sentenced to jail time and probation in 2016 due to the neglect children suffered at the school.
Kanawha Circuit Court case numbers: 20-C-98, 20-C-99, 20-C-100 20-C-204, 20-C-206