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In August last year, a teenage boy in California was approached at his workplace by at least two strangers who handcuffed him, took his phone and drove him for 27 straight hours to a boarding school in Missouri, prosecutors said Wednesday.

He was allegedly kept there for eight days against his will.

The teenager had been living away from his mother, Shana Gaviola, and had filed to be legally emancipated from the woman, whom he accused of mistreatment, court records show. A judge issued a protective order last year barring Gaviola from contacting her son, harassing him or restricting his movements, prosecutors said.

But in an indictment unsealed Tuesday, prosecutors allege that Gaviola and a former boarding school dean named Julio Sandoval violated that order by having the boy forcibly taken some 1,700 miles from Fresno, Calif., to a controversial Missouri school where Sandoval worked at the time. The teen was held there — even as his father requested his release — before being allowed to leave about a week later, according to the document.

Gaviola, 35, and Sandoval, 41, have each been charged with an interstate violation of a protective order and aiding and abetting. If convicted, they could each face up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, prosecutors said.

Gaviola has pleaded not guilty and remains in custody, according to court and jail records. Her attorney, Tony Capozzi, told The Washington Post in an email that Gaviola “had valid reasons for what she did.”

“There is more to the story than is being presented by the prosecutors in the indictment,” Capozzi said, adding that “Ms. Gaviola’s position will unfold as this case progresses.”

Sandoval could not be reached for comment, and his attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment late Thursday.

Sandoval was once the dean at Agapé Boarding School, a Christian school for “at-risk or unmotivated boys” in Stockton, Mo., the Kansas City Star reported. He left the school after five Agapé staff members were charged with assaulting students last September, according to the paper. The school, about 45 miles northwest of Springfield, is facing more than a dozen lawsuits accusing it of child abuse — allegations the school has denied. Moreover, its longtime former doctor has been charged with child sexual abuse crimes, the Springfield News-Leader reported. He has pleaded not guilty.

For years, Missouri had been a haven for unregulated Christian boarding schools, and allegations of abuse have mounted, an investigation by the Star found. Politicians there passed a law last year designed to crack down on possible abuse at those facilities, which now face health-and-safety inspections and employee background checks, the Star reported.

Sandoval now works at another boarding school — the Lighthouse Christian Academy in Piedmont, Mo. — and owns a company that transports teens to boarding schools, according to the Star. A message left with that academy was not immediately returned.

John Schultz, a lawyer for Agapé, said Gaviola’s son was at the school for seven days. School officials were unaware of the California protective order the boy had against his mother, he said. As soon as Agapé officials learned of the order, “discussions were had with the boy’s father to have him picked up,” Schultz said in an email.

In 2020, Gaviola’s son was living with another family in Fresno County, Calif., according to the indictment. Alleging that Gaviola mistreated him and subsequently harassed him and the family he moved in with, the boy applied in July 2021 for a restraining order, according to the indictment. After Gaviola was served with the order, she contacted Sandoval, who was still the Agapé Boarding School dean, and arranged to have the boy taken to Missouri, the indictment said.

On August 2021, Gaviola found out where her son would be and gave the transport personnel fake court documents to coerce the teen into going with them, the indictment states. They found Gaviola’s son at his place of work, “took hold” of him, handcuffed him and told him to get into their rental car, prosecutors say. They also allegedly took his phone and showed the fake documents to an adult he was living with.

The boy was “restrained” for the 27-hour drive to the Missouri boarding school, prosecutors say. As he was being driven across the country, law enforcement officials contacted Sandoval, telling him about the restraining order the boy had against his mom, according to court records. But Sandoval and Gaviola did not call off the boy’s transportation to the boarding school, prosecutors said.

Instead, he was dropped off there and was “detained” in the facility until the school released the boy to his father eight days later, the indictment states.

Prosecutors did not identify the people accused of transporting the teen from California to Missouri. Schultz, the boarding school’s attorney, said the facility “does not own, control or operate any transport service, [nor] does Agape sponsor or endorse any transport service.”

Source link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/02/gaviola-missouri-bording-school-charges/