Kat Von D joins Paris Hilton in call to close down Utah school where she was ‘locked up’

UPDATE: The Salt Lake Tribune is elevating cash to get inspection stories and sustained complaints for each youth residential therapy middle in Utah. Donations are accepted at sltrib.com/ourrecords.

Kat Von D has joined Paris Hilton in her name to close down a Provo reformatory faculty.

The tattoo artist who starred on the TLC actuality TV present “LA Ink” and has her personal vegan make-up line stated she additionally endured emotional and bodily abuse at Provo Canyon College. In an Instagram video post, she stated she was despatched to the power when she was 15, and spent “essentially the most traumatic six months of my life” there.

Von D, 38, determined to talk out Tuesday after watching Hilton’s documentary “That is Paris” and realizing she had been on the identical faculty. Hilton, 39, who was sent to the facility when she was 17, recounts a slew of abuses within the movie. She stated she was hit, yelled at and compelled into solitary confinement for hours at a time for not taking remedy.

Hilton began a Change.org petition in late September calling for the varsity to be shut down. It had gathered near 124,000 signatures as of Thursday afternoon. Von D’s revelation seemingly will reenergized the motion. She additionally known as for the varsity’s closure and her video was reposted by the lodge heiress.

“Such as you, I’ve at all times felt so ashamed to inform anybody about this,” Hilton posted. “However it’s not us who ought to be ashamed. We have been solely kids. The individuals who work at and run these locations are those who ought to be ashamed.”

Von D, whose full title is Katherine Von Drachenberg, stated that whereas she was on the faculty she was instructed, falsely, by a counselor that she had contracted HIV. She stated some residents have been compelled to sit down in a chair and stare at a wall for days. In a touch upon the video she stated she left the power “with main PTSD and different traumas as a result of unregulated, unethical and abusive protocols of this ‘faculty.’”

“I noticed that was form of the foundation to my consuming and in a while doing medication,” Von D stated within the video. “I’m sober 13 years now, and I’m so happy with that and so grateful for that, however after watching that documentary, I noticed that I nonetheless have some stuff to work by.”

Von D stated her dad and mom despatched her to the power after they turned involved when she turned focused on tattoos and dropped out of highschool. She stated she doesn’t blame them for sending her to Provo Canyon College and believes they “have been wildly misguided and instructed one thing like this could be an answer.”

Constitution Behavioral Well being Techniques owned the power from 1986 to 2000. Provo Canyon College is now owned by Common Well being Companies.