TIMELINE

January 5, 2006

Martin Lee Anderson's first day at the Bay County boot camp. He collapses after an altercation with the guards and is rushed to Bay Medical Center by ambulance at about 9:45 a.m. He is later life-flighted to Sacred Heart Hosptial in Pensacola.

January 6, 2006

Anderson dies around 1:30 a.m. at Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola.

February 13, 2006

CNN and the Miami Herald file a lawsuit for the surveillance tape from the boot camp to be released.

February 15, 2006

Anderson's parents hold a news conference asking for the release of the video. The National Black Caucus of Legislators and the NAACP join their efforts.

February 16, 2006

The results of the first autopsy by Dr. Charles Siebert of the 14th Judicial Circuit are released. Siebert says Anderson died from complications of sickle cell trait, a hereditary condition. The U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division and the FBI open a federal probe into the case.

February 17, 2006

The surveillance video is released showing the approximately 30 minute confrontation between Anderson and the guards. Some medical experts begin disputing Dr. Siebert's cause of death.

February 21, 2006

The Bay County Sheriff's Office gives a 90-day notice to the Department of Juvenile Justice that they will be shutting down the boot camp. State Attorney for the 14th Judicial Circuit, Steve Meadows, steps aside and requests a special prosecutor to oversee the case. Gov. Jeb Bush appoints Mark Ober of the 13th Judicial Circuit.

March 10, 2006

Anderson's family exhumes his body to have a second autopsy performed.

March 13, 2006

Second autopsy performed.

March 14, 2006

Preliminary results from the second autopsy released. Doctors say Anderson did not die from sickle cell trait.

March 28, 2006

E-mails between Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Guy Tunnell and Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen surface causing another controversy in the boot camp investigation. Tunnell was Bay County's sheriff when the boot camp first opened in 1994.

March 30, 2006

The FDLE is removed from the case by Ober's office.

April 6, 2006

The Bay County boot camp shuts its doors for good.

April 20, 2006

Tunnell resigns without giving a reason, but the move comes after widely published reports of a joke he made about the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Senator Barack Obama, who were coming to Tallahassee for a protest.

May 2, 2006

Full results of the second autopsy are released. Dr. Vernard Adams, medical examiner for the 13th Circuit, disputes Siebert’s autospy results, saying that Anderson died of suffocation because the guards blocked his airways and ammonia capsules held under his nose caused his airways to be blocked further.

July 12, 2006

Anderson's family files a $40 million lawsuit against the Bay County Sheriff's Office and Department of Juvenile Justice.

Augsut 9, 2006

Medical Examiners Commission votes to put Siebert on probation after an audit reveals 42 errors, mostly clerical, in his past autopsies.

November 20, 2006

Former DJJ employee Stephen Meredith files a lawsuit against DJJ. Meredith claims he was fired because he wouldn't help cover up Anderson's death.

November 28, 2006

Ober announces charges against the seven guards and one nurse. Each is charged with one count of manslaughter of a child.

March 27, 2007

The Bay County Sheriff's Office settles the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Anderson's family for $2.425 million. The state is expected to pay a remaining $5 million to the teen's parents.

May 23, 2007

Gov. Charlie Crist signs a claims bill, giving Anderson's parents a total $5 million settlement from the state. The same day, the Medical Examiners Commission votes not to recommend Siebert for reappointment when his term ends on June 30.

June 13, 2007

Medical Examiners Commission votes to remove Dr. Siebert from office over his work in the Martin Anderson autopsy. Specifically, the commission questions whether he actually performed some of the observations / procedures noted in the report. The complaint accuses Siebert of negligence in his duties, in violation of Florida law.

June 19, 2007

State Attorney Steve Meadows appoints Siebert as interim medical examiner.

September 24, 2007

Jury selection scheduled to begin. The Bay County Clerk of Courts office summons 1,450 residents to the Marina Civic Center over a week of proceedings.

October 3, 2007

The trial for the eight defendants begins.

Additionally (added by CAICA):

October 12, 2007

All eight defendants were acquitted; Florida University students protest

Tense Moments After Boot Camp Acquittal

October 13, 2007
By Melissa Nelson

PANAMA CITY, Fla. (AP) — Tensions ran high after eight former boot camp workers were acquitted of manslaughter in the death of a 14-year-old inmate who was videotaped being punched and kicked.

The case sparked outrage and spelled the end of Florida's system of juvenile boot camps, but it took a jury just 90 minutes Friday to decide that the death of Martin Lee Anderson was not a crime.

Anger over the verdict was obvious outside the courtroom, where bystanders screamed "murderer" at former guard Henry Dickens as he described his relief at the verdict.

"I am truly, truly sorry this happened. Myself, I love kids," said Dickens, 60. He said Anderson "wasn't beaten. Those techniques were taught to us and used for a purpose."

Anderson died a day after being hit and kicked by Dickens and six other guards as a nurse watched, a 30-minute confrontation that drew protests in the state capital.

The defendants testified they followed the rules at a get-tough facility where young offenders often feigned illness to avoid exercise. Their attorneys said that Anderson died not from rough treatment, but from a previously undiagnosed blood disorder.

The boy's mother, Gina Jones, stormed out of the courtroom. "I cannot see my son no more. Everybody see their family members. It's wrong," she said.

Anderson's family repeatedly sat through the painful video as it played during testimony. They had long sought a trial, claiming local officials tried to cover up the case. The conservative Florida Panhandle county is surrounded by military bases and residents are known for their respect for law and order.

"You kill a dog, you go to jail," said Gina Jones' lawyer, Benjamin Crump, outside court. "You kill a little black boy and nothing happens."

The guards, who are white, black and Asian, stood quietly as the judge read the verdicts. The all-white jury was escorted away from the courthouse and did not comment.

Special prosecutor Mark Ober said in a statement he was "extremely disappointed."

"In spite of these verdicts, Martin Lee Anderson did not die in vain," the statement read. "This case brought needed attention and reform to our juvenile justice system."

The defendants faced up to 30 years in prison had they been convicted of aggravated manslaughter of a child. The jury also decided against convicting them of lesser charges, including child neglect and culpable negligence.

Officials from the Department of Justice in Washington and U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Florida announced they were reviewing the state's prosecution. Defense attorneys, however, said they considered a federal civil-rights case to be unlikely.

"The Department of Justice has yet another opportunity, unfortunately, to demonstrate to America's minority populations that law enforcement officials acting outside the laws of this nation will be held accountable, that the misdeeds of a few rogue officers won't be allowed to tarnish the good work of the vast majority and that any guilty officers' conduct will be strongly scrutinized and met with remedial action rather than a wink and a nod," said NAACP Interim President & CEO Dennis Courtland Hayes.

"With a 90-minute verdict after a three-week trial (in the state case), it would be the same result," said attorney Bob Sombathy, who represents ex-guard Patrick Garrett.

Aside from hitting Anderson, the guards dragged him around the military-style camp's exercise yard and forced him to inhale ammonia capsules in what they said was an attempt to revive him. The nurse stood by watching.

Defense attorneys argued that the guards properly handled what they thought was a juvenile offender faking illness to avoid exercising on his first day in the camp. He was brought there for violating probation for stealing his grandmother's car and trespassing at a school.

The defense said Anderson's death was unavoidable because he had undiagnosed sickle cell trait, a usually harmless blood disorder that can hinder blood cells' ability to carry oxygen during physical stress.

Prosecutors said the eight defendants neglected the boy's medical needs after he collapsed while running laps. They said the defendants suffocated Anderson by covering his mouth and forcing him to inhale ammonia.

Anderson died Jan. 6, 2006, when he was taken off life support, a day after the altercation. The case quickly grew and shook up the state's boot camp and law enforcement system amid the boy's family alleging a cover-up.

An initial autopsy by Dr. Charles Siebert, the medical examiner for Bay County, found Anderson died of natural causes from sickle cell trait. A second autopsy was ordered and another doctor concluded that the guards suffocated Anderson through their repeated use of ammonia capsules and by covering his mouth.

Anderson's death led to the resignation of Florida Department of Law Enforcement chief Guy Tunnell, who established the camp when he was Bay County sheriff.

Then-Gov. Jeb Bush had been a strong supporter of the juvenile boot camps, but after Anderson's death he backed the Legislature's move to shut down the system and put more money into a less militaristic program.

The Legislature agreed to pay Anderson's family $5 million earlier this year to settle civil claims.

Boot Camp Death Verdict Sparks Outrage

All-White Jury Delivers 'Not Guilty' Verdict in Beating Death of Black Teen

October 13, 2007

A verdict in Florida has angered a community and raised questions about race and justice.

A jury has acquitted eight former boot camp workers in the death of 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson. He died one day after his videotaped beating that sparked outrage and brought an end to Florida's boot camps.

But the victim's family is not satisfied with the closing of the boot camps. They are furious over the ruling and say there was more than enough evidence to convict the guards.

"There was enough evidence," Anderson's father, Robert Anderson, told GMA's Kate Snow. "It was there in black and what-- What do you need a rocket science? I'm sick of this crap."

It took the jury just 90 minutes to decide that the kicking and punching of 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson by eight boot camp workers, captured on video, was not a crime.

Judge Michael Overstreet of the Bay County Circuit Court delivered the verdict against each defendant: "The defendant is not guilty. "

The seven boot camp guards and one nurse had been charged with manslaughter after Anderson died the day after being kicked and punched by the guards.

The defense argued that the rough treatment was routine procedure in the get-tough juvenile facility, and that the guards implemented it when Anderson was thought to be faking illness.

An autopsy found he had a previously undiagnosed blood disorder. The defense argued that is what caused his death. The all-white jury agreed.

"This is like adding insult to injury," Benjamin Crump, attorney for Anderson's mother, Gina Jones, said on "Good Morning America" of the defense's argument that sickle cell anemia played a role in Anderson's death.

He added that they had hoped for more diversity on the jury -- African-Americans who are familiar with sickle cell anemia and what it can and cannot do.

"You kill a dog, you go to jail," Crump said on the courtroom steps just after the verdict was delivered. "You kill a little black boy, nothing happens."

Anderson was in custody for joyriding in his grandmother's car. His family was devastated by the verdict -- and angry.

"Everything was in black-and-white [on] the video," Gina Jones said on the court room's steps. "How the hell they going to let them walk away?"

After more than two years of scrutiny, the guards and the nurse said they felt exonerated.

"[The jurors looked at] the evidence, and if you can get passed the emotion, all unanimously decided they were not guilty," said Robert Sombathy, attorney for guard Patrick Garrett.

That wasn't good enough for several hundred college students, who descended on Tallahassee, Fla.'s state capitol building, to protest the verdict.

One protestor said, "If you look at the video, I think it's really clear that they beat this child to death, and I think they're guilty."

It is not clear that there will be grounds for appeal. As a result of public outrage, Florida closed down all of its get-tough boot camps and opted for a less militaristic approach to juvenile justice.

Boot camp staff cleared of killing teenager

October 13, 2007
By Tom Leonard

Seven former boot camp guards and a nurse have been acquitted of manslaughter concerning the death of a 14-year-old boy who was hit and kicked in a videotaped altercation.

Martin's mother, Gina Jones (centre) stormed out of the courtroom after the verdict

An all-white jury took about 90 minutes to clear the defendants of killing Martin Lee Anderson, a black teenager who collapsed while running laps on his first day at the camp in Florida.

Prosecutors said the guards – who are white, black and Asian – neglected Martin by ignoring his medical needs and suffocated him by forcing him to inhale ammonia.

In the video, shown repeatedly during the trial in Panama City, Florida, the guards could be seen striking the boy with their fists and knees.

They also dragged him around the military style camp's exercise yard and forced him to inhale ammonia capsules in what they said was an attempt to revive him. The nurse stood by and watched.

Martin's mother, Gina Jones (centre) stormed out of
the courtroom after the verdict

The verdict came shortly after the publication of a US Congress report which catalogued widespread brutality, including the deaths of at least 10 children, in such camps.

Martin's mother, Gina Jones, stormed out of the courtroom after the verdict. The family had long sought a trial after they alleged that authorities initially tried to cover up the death in January 2006.

The incident sparked outrage and prompted Florida lawmakers to close down all military-style juvenile camps.

Acquittals in boot camp death ignite protests

October 13, 2007
By Brent Kallestad

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Justice was denied when the defendants in the Martin Lee Anderson manslaughter trial were acquitted in Panama City by a jury that needed only 90 minutes to decide, black lawmakers said Friday.

The acquittals ignited street protests in the capital that disrupted rush hour traffic.

By mid-afternoon, about 200 people — many from the historically black Florida A&M University nearby — were protesting the acquittals outside the Capitol, about 120 miles from Panama City.


Protestors walk arm in arm down a Tallahassee street
protesting the verdict in the Martin Lee Anderson case
on Friday.

The group then moved to a busy downtown intersection and sat down in the street, disrupting traffic.

"No justice. No peace!" they chanted.

The group first ignored pleas to not block traffic from two of the community's black leaders, Tallahassee Mayor John Marks and Florida A&M President James Ammons.

"I ain't going nowhere," responded Danyell Shackelford, a 23-year-old Florida State University student and Army veteran who served in Kuwait. "That's not what you sent me to war for."

But later, facing the prospect of arrests for blocking traffic, the protesters agreed to disband, but with a condition.

"Give them one week for the United States attorney to meet with us," FAMU student Phillip Agnew, 22, of Chicago told the protesters. "And give us a timeline for when some charges will be filed — or we will be back."

Black lawmakers in town for special sessions on a budget cut and property taxes, were upset that no blacks were included on the jury.

"All white jury. Why in Bay County?" asked Rep. Joyce Cusack, D-DeLand. "One of the most prejudiced areas in this state and I don't apologize for saying that. Here we are in the year 2007 that we still, we still are not treated fairly and with dignity."

Sen. Al Lawson, D-Tallahassee, echoed the comments.

"I didn't think that you could get a conviction in Bay County, and my assumption was correct," he said.

"It's almost if they've declared open season on black boys in Florida," state Sen. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami, said.

"Ninety minutes of deliberation for a child's life, a child who we saw beaten to death on videotape over and over again?" asked Wilson. "That's un-American. That is racist, discriminatory, bigotry."

However, officials from the Department of Justice in Washington and U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Florida announced they were reviewing the state's prosecution.

"I certainly hope there will be another option," said Rep. Frank Peterman Jr., D-St. Petersburg. "A higher court of law will judge this case at another level (so) that we will get real justice that will happen really soon."

Gov. Charlie Crist said he had already been informed by the Justice Department that it plans to review the case.

The Legislature, with Crist's encouragement, agreed to pay Anderson's family $5 million earlier this year to settle civil claims.

"I don't know what type of message that Bay County is trying to send to the state of Florida and to the rest of the country, but certainly this is not justice," said Rep. Terry Fields, D-Jacksonville.

"Poor Martin, there's no justice for him," Wilson added. "I'm just hoping the federal government now will take over the case, do further investigation because his civil rights and everything else was abridged in this."

Acquittal Fits the Pattern in Boot Camp Deaths

October 12, 2007
By Patrick J. Lyons

It took only 90 minutes today for a jury in Panama City, Fla., to decide that the juvenile boot-camp instructors who beat, kicked and kneed a 14-year-old boy, Martin Lee Anderson, were not guilty of killing him. A nurse at the camp was acquitted as well.
Press reports have noted that the jury was all white and the boy was black, and suggested that there was a racial element to the decision. (Some of the defendants were white, some black, and one was Asian.)

There was also conflicting medical testimony presented at the trial, with some witnesses saying that sickle-cell disorder — and not the actions of the guards and the nurse, which were seen in court in surveillance videotape from the camp — was the main reason the boy collapsed and died.

Even so, the jury’s decision fit with a longstanding pattern: When a youth who has been sent to one of these programs dies or is badly abused, the odds are that no one will be held responsible.

Just this week, a federal government report came to that conclusion after studying hundreds of complaints of abuse, torture, horrific conditions and deaths at juvenile boot camps, as Diana Jean Schemo wrote in The New York Times on Thursday:

The report, by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, examined the cases of 10 teenagers who died while at programs in six states, finding “significant evidence of ineffective management” and “reckless or negligent operating practices.” The report detailed evidence that teenagers were starved, forced to eat their own vomit, and to wallow for hours in their own excrement.

In one instance, a boy was so dehydrated that he ate dirt to survive, according to witnesses and an autopsy.

Investigators also found that owners and employees were seldom sent to prison, even when teenagers died in their care. Five of these programs are still in operation, some under new names or in other states.

The G.A.O. report, which refers to the boot camps as “residential treatment programs” for “troubled youth,” is posted in its entirety here (pdf) and summarized here (html).

As Ms. Schemo reported, the boot-camp industry has insisted for years that accusations of mistreatment and worse are, in the words of a trade group, “the noisy complaints of a few individuals.” (The trade group doesn’t call them boot camps, either, at least in its name: the National Association of Therapeutic Schools and Programs.)

The noise has sometimes made a difference. When past incidents, like the death of 16-year-old Aaron Bacon in Escalante, Utah, in 1994, broke into public view, some states moved to shut down the worst operators, step up oversight of the camp programs and improve conditions in them, and the Anderson case has spurred such an effort in Florida. But in other states, the camps remain completely unregulated, and critics say it is only a matter of time before the next Aaron Bacon or Martin Lee Anderson hits the headlines.

Guards, nurse acquitted of manslaughter in boot camp case

October 12, 2007
The Associated Press

PANAMA CITY, Florida: Eight former boot camp workers were acquitted of manslaughter in the death of a 14-year-old boy who was videotaped being punched and kicked. The scene sparked outrage and changes in the Florida juvenile system, but it took jurors just 90 minutes to decide it was not a crime.

Anger over the verdict was obvious outside the courtroom Friday, where bystanders screamed "murderer" at former guard Henry Dickens as he described his relief at the verdict.

Martin Lee Anderson died a day after being hit and kicked by Dickens and six other guards as a nurse watched, a 30-minute confrontation that drew protests in the state capital and spelled the end of Florida's system of juvenile boot camps.

"I am truly, truly sorry this happened. Myself, I love kids," said Dickens, 60. He added that Anderson "wasn't beaten. Those techniques were taught to us and used for a purpose."

The defendants testified that they followed the rules at a get-tough facility where young offenders often feigned illness to avoid exercise. Their attorneys said that Anderson died not from rough treatment, but from a previously undiagnosed blood disorder.

The boy's mother, Gina Jones, stormed out of the courtroom. "I cannot see my son no more. Everybody see their family members. It's wrong," she screamed.

"You kill a dog, you go to jail," said her lawyer, Benjamin Crump. "You kill a little black boy and nothing happens." He spoke outside court, which is across the street from the now-closed Bay County boot camp.

Anderson's family repeatedly sat through the painful video as it played during testimony. They had long sought a trial, claiming local officials tried to cover up the case. The conservative Florida Panhandle county is surrounded by military bases and residents are known for their respect for law and order.

The guards, who are white, black and Asian, stood quietly as the judge read the verdicts. The all-white jury was escorted away from the courthouse and did not comment.

Special prosecutor Mark Ober said in a statement he was "extremely disappointed," but added, "In spite of these verdicts, Martin Lee Anderson did not die in vain. This case brought needed attention and reform to our juvenile justice system."

The defendants would have faced up to 30 years in prison had they been convicted of aggravated manslaughter of child. The jury also decided against convicting them of lesser charges, including child neglect and culpable negligence.

Officials from the Department of Justice in Washington and U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Florida announced they were reviewing the state's prosecution. Defense attorneys, however, said they considered a federal civil-rights case to be unlikely.

Aside from hitting Anderson, the guards dragged him around the military-style camp's exercise yard and forced him to inhale ammonia capsules in what they said was an attempt to revive him. The nurse stood by watching.

Defense attorneys argued that the guards properly handled what they thought was a juvenile offender faking illness to avoid exercising on his first day in the camp. He was brought there for violating probation for stealing his grandmother's car and trespassing at a school.

The defense said Anderson's death was unavoidable because he had undiagnosed sickle cell trait, a usually harmless blood disorder that can hinder blood cells' ability to carry oxygen during physical stress.