We left the children’s psych hospital, I had no idea which way was home, I was just happy to be in the car with my dad, about 25 minutes into the drive I noticed that we were in some very bad neighborhoods, very run-down areas. I saw the welcome to Detroit sign, at this point I knew something wasn’t right, my dad never drove into Detroit, I started asking where we were going and he told me that it was a short cut, that was a lie. We pulled into my next Hell on Earth location. St Francis Home for boys, the property was massive, the building was the biggest building I had ever seen in my life. I didn’t want to follow my dad to that building, something was not right, I could feel it. He picked me up and carried me up the front steps into this massive building.
Let’s first talk about this building as I remember it, it was 4 stories above ground, one story underground, it was built in 1917 by the Catholic Archdiocese as a orphanage housing up to 300 children aged 6 to 14, from an architectural view point it was stunning, but the horror’s that it contained, could not be visualized from its outside beauty. The first floor contained the offices, chapel, gym and swimming pool, and locker rooms, as well as the dining hall, the second floor had classrooms, medical treatment, and the Nuns sleeping quarters. The third floor was mostly sleeping and shower areas for the children from age 6 to 9 or 10, the fourth floor was the sleeping and shower areas for the children 10 or older, each area had a wooden wardrobe for your clothing, and shelves for your toiletries. with a single cot type bed and pillow next to it. When the light went out it was so dark. There were one or two civilian employees per floor at night during sleeping hours. They were useless and maybe complicit; your screams would go unanswered. the Basement floor was a massive containment area for all the kids, long hallways, and big rooms like day rooms with pool tables, ping pong tables and games and other things to occupy time. Each one was staffed by at least one civilian employee, most times two, as most rooms held between 10 to 20 children. The lower hallways were very creepy to walk through by yourself. On the back side of the building had the Incinerator, where all the trash was burned daily, by a handicapped man that lived in a room on the first floor right by it. If you knocked on his door and went down the steps, he would throw Now N Later candies out onto the ground. My recollection may not be 100% correct, but this is how my almost 8-year-old brain remembers this buildings layout.
My dad carried me up the stairs to the first floor, and standing there were 2 Nuns, I had already had some bad experiences with the nuns at the school’s I was in before. My dad tried to explain to me that this was only temporary that I could come home on weekends in a few weeks, he told me that I needed to behave and keep my anger under control. I didn’t know what a merit-based program was all about, but it wouldn’t have made a difference for me, and the hell I was about to go through. My Dad once again walked away, left me with stranger’s, I watched him as long as I could, the nuns were grabbing me and trying to get me to go with them. Then came a civilian employee who just picked me up and carried me away. I ended up in one of the basement day rooms in some group, or division, the next day was a school day, like 2nd grade work taught by the nuns, I got into a fight with another kid my age, we were separated, and I was put into a closet, to calm down and think about my actions. I was blamed for the fight because I was the new kid. My first week there resulted in at least 5 fights, between the classroom and after school dayrooms, it be honest, that week was my first real life interactions with African American’s. In my view they were mean and bullies, and I felt like I was being picked on all the time being a white kid. sometimes the fights would be me against just one other kid, other times it would be me again 2 or 3, I was small, but I didn’t have quit in me, a lot of times I would end up in the infirmary for the nurse nun to treat my cuts or bruises. I was told, that I needed to behave to be able to go home for weekend home visits. So I tried my best, but it seemed every Thursday or Friday the same kid would start a fight with me. It turned out this kid didn’t have a family to come pick him up, he would start stuff with as many kids as he could, so that they would lose their home visit weekends. After 4 or 5 weeks of not getting home on Friday, I figured it out and avoided him at all costs, it was also my 8th birthday week. That first weekend at home wasn’t the greatest, I loved seeing my little sister, got to see my real mom for a few hours on Saturday, but me and Debbie really clashed, and clashed hard, I had learned a lot of curse words and they all came out of my mouth that weekend.
My dad took me back to St. Francis early Sunday, because of my behavior and mouth with Debbie. I did not see my family again for months, even if I was on my best behavior, my dad wouldn’t show up to get me, she didn’t want me there, I got angrier, the civilian staff encouraged fights in the day rooms, I believe they use to make bets on them. I think I went almost 4 months before I got another home visit, time just seems to slip away when you don’t have much to look forward to, the routine of the days just seem to blend together, my behavior was constantly good except for an occasional fight, there were certain Civilian staff to avoid at all cost, my behavior earned me the right to be an altar boy in the Wednesday and Sunday services, the Sunday services never had the full population of children because of home visits, and I was mostly there on Sundays, my dad only got me once a month, his swing shift schedule dictated my visits at this point, Debbie didn’t want to be the one to have to watch me during the day. My mom didn’t have a legal right to have me, I was under the term of treatment, so there was nothing a court would do to stop said treatment.
Around my 9th birthday, I did go home for weekend visit, my dad tried to do major holidays and birthdays, I remember begging him to bring me home for good, and he kept saying once they said I was completed with treatment we would try it. After I turned 9 things changed, an older kid befriended me, kind of took me under his wing so to speak, his name to me was Benji, he was 11 or 12 years old so his bed area was on the 4th floor, I was still on the 3rd floor, one night after lights out he showed up on my floor next to my bed waking me up. told me to follow him, I got up and followed him to the stairwell, it was there that my life took a major change, he told me to get on my knees, and to suck him, I said no, what are you doing, your my friend, he grabbed me by the neck and pushed my head over the rail of the stairs, he told me if I didn’t suck him off he was going to throw me over the rail, I was almost unconscious when he let me go, he forced my mouth onto him and did what I didn’t understand, when he was finished he told me that if I told anyone he could get to me anywhere I was. This happened at least 4 more times, one time he was trying to do anal sex on me, but because he was so much taller than me it didn’t work, all these times were in the same place in the stairwell, where I was vulnerable to being thrown over the stair rail. I always tried to stay awake to try to hide from him, but he would catch me sleeping, this happened over about 4 months. The one day I was walking to the gym, by myself, and out of a doorway him and another kid jumped out and he grabs me. I went into full combat mode, I just started swinging, they got me on the floor in the hallway and tried to drag me back into that room they came from. I kicked one kid right in the nuts, he fell to the ground, both of them were a lot bigger than me, I got back up and was swinging at Benji, I had to swing upwards because he was so tall to me. This is when I missed and punched a double pane glass window, my hand went through the window, I yanked my hand back out and was ready to fight, they both took off running, because of the noise of a breaking window. There wasn’t much noise from the fight itself, because we had learned in the day rooms to keep the fights quiet. I took off running down the hallway in the opposite direction that they went, about 2 minutes after I took off, I felt something wet on my hand and looked down, it was covered with blood, I walked into the swimming pool locker room and grabbed a towel off the floor and wrapped my hand up. I found a side door that went outside and started walking, away from the place, I didn’t know where I was going, I was trying to figure out in my mind what had just happened, about a half mile down Fenkell Rd, I heard someone running up behind me, I turned around and it was Mr. Taylor, one of the Civilian Employees, he got to me and pulled his belt off and put it around my upper arm and tightened it down good, I passed out.
I remember waking up, in the infirmary, and Sister Teresa, the nurse nun, was there and asked me what happened, I told her about the fight, I was taken by ambulance to a local hospital. The doctor’s tried to stitch my open wound on my wrist/hand closed but as soon as I moved my hand it popped back open. They packed it and waited for my dad to get there, during the wait, the doctors and Mr. Taylor asked me what happened and who I was fighting with and why, I told them everything that had happened to me, including the sexual assaults. I never went back to St. Francis.
My dad showed up at the hospital, and was informed on my injuries, and what happened, I know that he was angry but didn’t take it out on me, it turns out I got a major infection in my arm from the dirty towel, they did an overnight penicillin drip to try to clear up the infection, otherwise they were going to have to take my arm at the shoulder. The next day (I believe) they performed a skin graft from my leg to my hand, with 136 stitches inside and 67 on the outside. When I came to from surgery they had a cast on my arm, to keep me from messing with the injury site. I was released from the hospital and went home to my dad’s house. I spent my 10th birthday with my family. I was home for the moment, but it wouldn’t last long, after I got the cast off, 5 weeks my anger caught up to me. and it was anything but controlled, it was pure rage.
If you’re interested in who Benji was, his name was Benjamin (Tony) Atkins, he was a serial killer in Detroit, he murdered 11 women during a 8 month period in 91 and 92. A book has been written by an amazingly talented author named B.R. Bates, who has a keen eye for detail of all the stories she writes about, you can find the Book about Atkins at the following link. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0DYPG7299 also you can find her other works at BRBates.com
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