Paris Hilton testified on Capitol Hill about the devastating experience she endured at a youth rehabilitation center while advocating for sweeping reforms to the foster and youth rehabilitation system.
“When I was 16 years old, I was ripped from my bed in the middle of the night and transported across state lines to the first four residential facilities,” Hilton told the House Ways and Means Committee.
‘For two years I was force-fed and sexually abused by the staff. I was forcibly restrained…stripped naked, thrown into solitary confinement,” the Hilton hotel heiress continued.
Paris Hilton testified on Capitol Hill about the devastating experience she endured at a youth rehabilitation center while advocating for sweeping reforms to the foster and youth rehabilitation system
She said her parents were “completely manipulated” by the facilities and were unaware of the treatment she was undergoing.
“This $23 billion-a-year industry views this population as dollar signs and operates without meaningful oversight,” Hilton said.
The hearing focused on modernizing child welfare programs. Hilton focused her testimony on eradicating abuse in youth treatment centers.
She urged the reauthorization and reform of Title IV-B – which provides funding to states for community-based, prevention-oriented programs to support family reunification and permanence for children in foster care.
Hilton highlighted the story of 16-year-old Cornelius Fredericks, who entered Lakeside Academy after his mother died and his father was in prison. Fredericks died after being restrained by facility staff in April 2020 for throwing a sandwich. Two employees were convicted of involuntary manslaughter over the incident.
“The state could have prevented this,” Hilton said.
‘When I was 16 years old. I was ripped from my bed in the middle of the night and transported across state lines to the first four residential facilities,” Hilton told the House Ways and Means Committee.
Hilton urged the reauthorization and reform of Title IV-B – which provides funding to states for community-based, prevention-oriented programs to support family reunification and sustainability for children in foster care
‘For two years I was force-fed and sexually abused by the staff. I was forcibly restrained…stripped naked, thrown into solitary confinement,” the Hilton hotel heiress continued.
Meanwhile, Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) urged the need to reform the foster care system — and keep more children at home with their families. ‘Poverty should not be the only reason that a child is removed from home. [from the home]’, said Smith.
The chairman told a story about a Missouri mother and three children who lived in a barn without electricity or running water when her children were placed in foster care.
“Three years passed between the time the children were removed from the home and the time the court found the mother’s living conditions inadequate,” Smith said.
“Although she had made substantial, substantial improvements in both her housing and transportation situation, the court deemed a one-bedroom apartment too small and a three-bedroom house with her boyfriend’s children too small, resulting in the termination of our parental rights.”
Smith said it costs $30,000 a year to keep a child in foster care in Missouri, and this particular case cost the state $360,000.
“Issuing even a fraction of those fines up front could have provided this family with adequate housing, laundry and bathroom facilities, and assistance in obtaining and maintaining employment.” It would also affect the children and their mother and spare them trauma from the divorce.”
In 2022, approximately 369,000 American children were in foster care.