Ben Ferons's story, 2003
I had the worst day of my life at Casa by the Sea. There I was sitting on my computer at my parents house, 16 years old, its like midnight and someone knocks on the door ... I’m just like wtf - who the hell could that be? So my dad answers the door like he was sitting there and just waiting for these guys to show up. He said, “Ben, these are my friends”. His ‘friends’ were three big ass dudes from Casa. I can’t remember their names but one had two different colored eyes. Anyway, they surround me at the computer chair and are like... “Let’s go.” And so I’m like ... “Go? ... go where?” One of the guys says “We can do this the easy way or the hard way but either way we are going”. So I’m trying to be cool with these guy and I’m like ok lets cruise.... so two of them grab my arm on each side and one of them gets behind me as I’m being escorted out the door. I’m thinking to myself - I can’t go with these guys I gotta break lose ... and fast ... so we get out front and I push the two guys on my side forward while doing a backflip move and I start to book it ... sure enough the guy behind me jumps out all football tackle status and grabs me by the ankles and I face plant trying to wrestle this one dude off me. Then another one runs over and just starts kicking me like a soccer ball then other guy gets up and is doing jujitsu moves on me. Finally they get this hold on my thumb and wrist that killed so I gave up and hopped in the back of this Ford Explorer.
We cruised down into Mexico listening to the dark side of the moon album. It was actually quite nirvanic driving down there next to the beach coast wondering what the hell was in store of the rest of my life, listening to dark side of the moon ... but anyway we get there and the guys are like, “Oh man you are gonna have great fun here ... you’ll catch up in school, you'll play football, all sorts of good things happening here.” So anyway I’m there for maybe a month and I wake up to find the staff flipping on and off the lights screaming “HEAD COUNT”. As usual I hop out of my bunk, and jump inline do headcount. So now its the part where you can go to the bathroom or brush your teeth, make your bed and stuff before you go to school… and I dropped something and a guy picks it up for me and I say to him "Thanks". BAM ! First consequence of the day, a category-3 for verbal communication. I sat my ass in worksheets listening to that stupid tape for three hours...."If you ask a family of three how much is costs them to live, they will tell you all of it, and then if you ask a family with the same circumstances but who make twice as much they will tell you it takes all of it”... then the tape is all Every Daaay every daaay ......still to this day I can hear that shit perfectly in my head every daaay every daaay from those stupid ass tapes....
So I’m like ok ... no sweat off my back .... just lost my points for the week and so now I’ll have to be here an extra week and sit in worksheets but... its whateva its whateva.... make it back to my family “Loyalty” - this was our song: "UNO DOS TRES QUATRO CINCO CINCO SES WE ARE LOYALTY WE HAVE INTEGRITY ESSENCE AND ESTEEM WE ARE THE NUMBER ONE TEAM, WE ARE THE ROYALTY OF THE FACILITY WE HAVE HEART WE WONT BREAK APART WHO ARE WE LOYALTY!" So, I make it back for lunch and we are passing around the little bowl of salsa cause its fish day (one time dude found live worms in his fish) ...... and the guy tries to pass me the bowl of salsa and I shake my head to say no thanks...... sure enough this upper level fucker trying to make his way to the top level sees me and is like NON VERBAL COMMUNICATION CAT -3 ... ok ... back to worksheets... its cool Ben its cool keep yourself calm just lost two weeks worth of points and its only noon just go sit in worksheet another few hours get back to your family and work on getting your ass out of here...... so I do and make it back to my family and we are all lined up for the time we get in the basketball court area....
I’m standing in line all stoked to be out of worksheet ready to be good, submissive and do as I’m told ... sure enough the SAME MOTHER FUCKER that gave me a cat-3 for nonverbal gives me a cat-2 for not having my feet together touching in line.... so at this point I’m just irate ... I freaked out... I get out of the line start yelling shit and just start running around inside the facility just pure adrenaline no physical feeling all up in my head.... I go up the stairs over the big green and just start punching in all the windows... (I later found out sick bed was in one of those rooms... if I got anyone cut from shattering that glass I apologize) ... the fathers are all freaking out yelling over their radios CODIO ROJO CODIO ROJO ...code red... and so I jump up on the railing run like five steps, as someone tried to grab my foot cause and I just leap with all my might jumped like 10 feet to this rain gutter on the side of the wall, climb up this thing like a fucking monkey and get on top of the roof of the place.... and I finally had a moment where my consciousness came to me and I’m like ... ok I could try to jump outside and run back to America... but I heard people only tried breaking out of there twice... one of them jumped on the other side of the wall and broke his heel and they got him and the other dude got out ran to a hotel called his parents to pick him up and then his parents said ok cool we will be there and they called the family rep who got some people over to that hotel and brought him back....I also heard there was like a 2g reward for anyone on the streets that brings you back and they have your picture at the border and won’t let you across.... and all the fathers are down there screaming GET DOWN ... so I’m like ok I’m just gonna jump right back in here ... I jumped off the fucking roof it had to be a 25 - 30 foot drop.
I landed in the middle of the big green... knocked out... I start to come too all fuzzy having the wah wahs going on in my head and everyone yelling at me to just lay there - I jump right the fuck back up onto my feet (broke my heel and ankle and NEVER ONCE saw a doctor for it... I had to limp around for about three months from this shit... no pain meds or anything) but I hop up and they take me to Dace Goulding’s office and as I’m going in I see the poster on the wall one of those mormon posters with a couple of parrots and it says, "foul language is for the birds" and so I get into his office I’m all bloody from punching in the windows my hands are all cut up my shit is hurting I don’t know what’s going on, and Dace is just yelling at me "YOU NEED TO WORK THIS FUCKING PROGRAM" just cussing and cussing and I just look him in the eyes and I’m like "foul language is for the birds Dace" and he yells TAKE HIM TO R&R! So I get up there and they are like sit in structure and I tell them no...... so they start ripping my right wrist to the back of my head til it feels like it will snap off and tell me to sit and structure every time I said no they would pull it further and the upper levels are all like dude just sit in structure and I won’t.... then my cuts that had just dried got reopened from them pulling on me and shit and I got blood on the guys shoe and he was pissed so one of them holds my arms behind my back and the other is punching me in the stomach and he’s all "YOU LIKE THAT?"" I spit in his face and told him I like his mom and then they just kept hitting me for like an hour and finally got tired and just let me lay there in my blood and pain for the rest of the day... I spent ONE FUCKING MONTH in intervention EVERY DAY sitting in structure staring at a wall... like for real... three 5 minute breaks a day to eat and go to the bathroom... what is that? I tried to tell my parents about what happened to me but they go into your letters after you type them up and they change what you say so my parents thought I just fucking fell off the roof they had no idea all the shit that went down. Man that place is so fucked up and I got stories and complaints on it for days and days but I will stop my little rant and rave right here... all you Casa survivors my heart goes out to you... PEACE AND ONE LOVE ALL