Posted on 09/30/2025 11:12:41 AM PDT by Morgana
Five years after the doors of Circle of Hope Girls Ranch in Humansville, Missouri, were closed, its owner Stephanie Householder pleaded guilty to abuse charges against the girls in her care, according to KRCG.
Earlier this month, Householder received a sentence of 120 days in prison, to be served concurrently, for the child abuse charges, but was given credit for time served.
She was sentenced to five years of probation for charges of endangering the welfare of a child. If she violates the terms of her probation, Householder will have to serve eight years in prison.
Her trial was set to start on September 29.
Householder’s husband Boyd, who died in jail last year, had been charged with 79 counts, varying from statutory rape to statutory sodomy to child endangerment and abuse.
In 2020, former students and the couples’ estranged daughter, Amanda Householder, shared accounts of an atmosphere of abuse.
Emily Stoddard’s parents drove from Washington to remove their daughter from Circle of Hope.
Stoddard and other students reported punishments including the use of restraints such as handcuffs, residents being forced to physically restrain other residents, food and water being withheld, and corporal punishment administered with a leather paddle or belt.
The Householders denied the charges against them at the time.
According to the Kansas City Star, survivors say the state of Missouri and the Attorney General’s Office let them down by offering the plea deal.
“This is a travesty,” Emily Adams, a vocal advocate for boarding school abuse victims, said about the sentence. “Justice was not served. I am very disappointed in Judge (David) Munton’s decision to not send her to prison. This is a slap in the face to all the victims and survivors everywhere.
Maggie Drew, who attended Circle of Hope from 2007 to 2013, told the Star in a text message, “That she was given that option and not treated like the criminal monster she truly is, and made to stand trial is wrong. I feel the state has failed the survivors of Circle of Hope greatly in the outcome of this case.”
Kansas City Attorney Rebecca Randles, who has represented survivors of the Circle of Hope in a civil lawsuit, said Householder’s sentence “is not perfect justice.”
“But the most important piece is that she is convicted, and any conviction is a great step toward keeping children safe,” Randles said. “With a conviction, she can’t open other facilities or things like that.”
Circle of Hope is not the only Missouri boarding school to close based on abuse allegations.
Lighthouse Christian Academy, a boarding school for troubled boys in Piedmont, Missouri, closed in March 2024. Authorities charged ABM Ministries owners Larry and Carmen Musgraves with first-degree kidnapping for allegedly locking a student in a room. Craig Wesley Smith Jr., who was the principal of Lighthouse, was charged with forcible sodomy and attempted forcible rape, according to the Associated Press.
In February 2024, Shelterwood Academy near Independence, Missouri, announced it would close its doors. It had also been the subject of allegations of abuse and mistreatment.
Agape Boarding School in Stockton, Missouri, closed in January 2023 after at least 19 abuse lawsuits, a petition to investigate the school, and multiple hearings to shut it down. Representatives of Agape said the closing was merely due to financial reasons.
In 2021, police charged Agape’s longtime doctor David Smock with 11+ felony sex abuse crimes. Near the end of 2022, police arrested Steve Robert Wukmer, a former children’s minister who had worked at Agape — and boarding schools in three other states — for possessing 215 counts of child pornography.
A boarding school for girls? What could possibly go wrong?!?!
I don't know how one serves a single sentence concurrently.
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