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ST. LOUIS (AP) — Advocates for victims of abuse at Missouri boarding schools on Monday urged the state’s attorney general to launch an investigation, work with local prosecutors and take other steps aimed at stemming the tide of abuse. Three Christian boarding schools in southern Missouri have shut down since 2020 amid wide-ranging abuse allegations levied by current and former students. Several people affiliated with those schools are facing criminal charges. Advocates who worry that more abuse is going unpunished gathered Monday outside Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s St. Louis office to demand action. “This is a structural problem,” said...

Sixteen former Agape Boarding School students who sued for alleged abuse at the southwest Missouri school have settled their cases for undisclosed amounts. The number represents about two-thirds of the two dozen lawsuits filed against Agape Baptist Church, the organization that operated the now-closed school near Stockton in Cedar County. Court records show that the plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed their cases “with prejudice,” meaning the suits cannot be filed again. Four cases were dismissed in January and refiled in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri and four are pending in state court. The newly settled cases, filed since...

A Christian boarding school in Missouri that’s been under intense scrutiny over abuse allegations announced Wednesday that it will close later this month due to financial hardship. Agape Boarding School in Stockton has been the subject of state and location investigations and several lawsuits from former students. It will stop providing service effective Jan. 20, according to a statement from the school for boys. Attendance at Agape plummeted after abuse allegations surfaced. Agape had 132 students 13 months ago, its lawyer, John Schultz said. It now has 12. The school’s focus now is “on getting the boys who remain in...

W hen Andrew Breshears arrived at the Agapé Boarding School in 2018, he was a sandy-haired 12-year-old who weighed less than 100 pounds. He enjoyed watching movies, listening to Elvis, and playing soccer with his friends. “I was sheltered,” Breshears says. But he struggled at home. When he was told he couldn’t live with his mother after her stint in rehab, he threatened to kill himself, and another person from the household. His grandparents sent him to a mental hospital, then to Agapé. At first glance, the facility for “at-risk and unmotivated boys” — a Baptist institution in Stockton, Missouri...

The former director of Agape Boarding School pleaded with a Cole County judge on Monday to keep himself off the state’s central registry of child abuse and neglect, so he can keep working with children. Bryan Clemensen was the long-time director of the Stockton-based reform school for troubled boys until last month, he testified Monday. The Missouri Department of Social Services says it substantiated five preponderances of evidence findings against Clemensen — one count of child neglect and four of physical abuse. The department is seeking to add Clemensen’s name to the state’s child abuse and neglect central registry, a...

OZARK, Mo. (AP) — Two men who were facing felony charges alleging they abused boys at a private Christian boarding school in southwest Missouri have pleaded guilty to misdemeanors, and the case against a third was dropped. Scott Dumar, 46, the medical coordinator at the Agape Boarding School near Stockton, pleaded guilty Thursday to two misdemeanors and was placed on two years probation. Everett Graves, 40, pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor. The case against Chris McElroy was dropped after the alleged victim did not appear at a preliminary hearing Thursday, The Kansas City Star reported. They were among five staff...

Agape Boarding School’s longtime leader recently filed for a temporary restraining order against the state to keep his name off Missouri’s Central Registry for child abuse and neglect. Bryan Clemensen filed a motion for the restraining order on Nov. 22 in Cole County Circuit Court. The next day, Judge Brian Stumpe granted the order and the Missouri Department of Social Services, which maintains the registry, received a summons. “It is therefore Ordered that Respondent be and is hereby restrained from listing Petitioner on the Missouri Child Abuse and Neglect Central Registry,” according to a docket entry on the state’s online...

Editor’s note: this story has been updated to clarify the appeals court order, which halts any action in the case until further notice. The Missouri Court of Appeals has ordered a Cedar County judge to halt all further action in the Agape Boarding School case until it issues a final decision on a recent motion. “You are directed to refrain from taking further action,” the appellate court wrote in a ruling that was issued Wednesday, “ ... until further order of this court.” In what is called a preliminary writ of prohibition, the appellate court said the only action Associate...

A southwest Missouri judge signed an order late Wednesday to close the embattled Agape Boarding School, but early Thursday said he wanted more information before the order is carried out. Attorney General Eric Schmitt and the Department of Social Services filed a petition in Cedar County Circuit Court asking the judge to shut down the school, citing concerns about the safety of students. The request for the court injunction Wednesday came after an Agape staff member was placed on the state’s Central Registry for physical abuse, The Star has learned. Judge David Munton signed the order calling for the immediate...

A California mom arranged for her estranged son to be abducted after he applied for emancipation, with the youngster then driven 27 hours to a boarding school. Shana Gaviola, 35, is said to have embarked on the scheme in August 2021 on learning the unnamed 17 year-old boy wanted to legally break away from her. Gaviola, of Fresno, has been charged with violating a protective over the incident by a federal court, and remains in custody. The boy, who had successfully applied for a restraining order against Gaviola, was approached by a 'transfer team' from the Agapé Boarding School for...

A newly surfaced video that shows what many describe as abuse of a boy at Agape Boarding School in the late 1990s has renewed calls to close the school. In the footage, a man who former students say is Frank Burton — a long-time pastor at the Cedar County school — can be seen forcing a boy wearing a bathrobe to run alongside him around the perimeter of an outdoor volleyball court, which also served as the school’s boot camp area. It’s been common practice at the school to make boys wear robes if they were on suicide watch or...

Students at a controversial school for troubled boys were made to roll around in camel waste to 'build character,' outraged parents have told DailyMail.com. Agapé Boarding School for Boys in Stockton, Missouri, is currently facing 19 lawsuits alleging torture, starvation, as well as sexual, emotional, and physical abuse. Five new lawsuits were filed in the state last week by former students from California, Texas, Florida, and Mississippi, who attended the school from 2014 until now. The students accuse Agapé Boarding School and the Agapé Church of negligence, battery by staff and fellow students, torture and starvation, according to legal documents...

A whistleblower who got her own parents arrested and charged with more than 100 counts of abuse at a girls' school has now set out on a 'mission' to close down an associated facility. The Agapé Boarding School for Boys in Stockton, Missouri, has been hit with 14 lawsuits and Amanda Householder believes the time has come to shutter it for good. ‘The fact that the Agapé Boarding School is still open is beyond infuriating,’ Householder, 31, who was key to getting her parents' Circle of Hope school in nearby Humansville shut in 2020, told DailyMail.com. ‘When Circle of Hope...

CEDAR COUNTY, Mo. (KY3) - Several more former students of a boy’s Christian boarding school in Cedar County are filing lawsuits. The group claims a wide range of abuse, from starvation to physical and emotional abuse. ”For nearly three decades, students at Agape Boarding School have experienced emotional, mental, physical and sexual abuse,” the group’s attorney, Ryan Frazier, said in a statement to KY3 on Friday. “Today, we filed petitions in Cedar County for nine of those victims, to pursue justice for the trauma they endured and to have their voices heard.” Robert Bucklin went to the school from age...

Maggie Drew’s dad sent her to Circle of Hope Girls’ Ranch in Missouri in 2007, hoping strict Christian teachings would stop his 14-year-old daughter’s teenage rebellion. Instead, Drew said, she found herself in a nightmare, sexually abused by one of the boarding school’s founders and left with permanent spinal injuries after a fall from a hay barn for which she received no medical attention. Just 25 miles away at another Christian boarding school, Brett Harper says he endured abuse that included staff members stomping on his back. He said his injuries required two spinal surgeries and left him disabled. They...

David Smock, the longtime Agape Boarding School doctor in southwest Missouri, has been charged with four new child sex crimes, two of which involve an alleged second male victim. The four charges were filed Tuesday in Cedar County, according to an online court docket. Those new counts are in addition to the eight sex crimes filed in Cedar County against the Stockton doctor by the state Attorney General’s office in December. He also faces three similar charges in Greene County. All 15 counts against Smock are felonies. Smock, 57, was arrested in Arkansas in late December and has been held...

The Missouri government board responsible for licensing doctors and other health care professionals is interested in criminal court matters related to Dr. David Smock, the longtime physician for Stockton-based Agape Boarding School. But under Missouri law, the State Board of Registration for the Healing Arts can't say why. Smock was recently charged with 11 felony sex crimes against children. Three of the charges originate from Greene County. Eight of the charges were issued by Cedar County, the rural home of Agape's Independent Fundamental Baptist boarding school campus, as well as one of Smock's clinics. Smock has pleaded not guilty to...

A former student of a Missouri boarding school has been identified as the suspect who shot and wounded three Houston police officers after an hours-long standoff Thursday night. Roland Caballero, 31, is in custody after the Thursday night shooting, according to ABC13 and KPRC 2 in Houston. Caballero reportedly was shot in the neck and was taken to the hospital. Two of the three officers had been released from the hospital as of Friday afternoon, according to Houston Police. The third is in stable condition, police said. Caballero attended Agape Boarding School in Stockton, Missouri, as a teenager from around...

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) - Greene County investigators say a doctor wanted for sex crimes while at Agape Boarding School in Cedar County is on the run. Investigators say a warrant was issued for the arrest of Dr. David Smock, 56. Smock faces charges of second-degree statutory sodomy, third-degree child molestation of a child less than 14 years of age, and enticement or attempted enticement of a child less than 15 years of age. The investigation dates back to 2020. Agape is a Christian-based boarding school near Stockton. Investigators say Smock became a ‘father figure’ for the juvenile while at Agape....