Child of Rage

IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE

FOR PREVENTION OF CHILD ABUSE

I wanna kill you, I wanna kill

you, mommy, I wanna kill you!

CHILD OF RAGE:

A Story of Abuse

Are people afraid of you, Beth?

- Who's afraid of you, Beth?

- John.

Your brother. And why is

your brother afraid of you?

- Because I hurt him so much.

- Okay.

And what... at night time, what do

your parents do to your door?

- Lock it shut.

- Why did they lock it shut?

Because they don't want

me to hurt John.

Right. And they're kind of afraid of...

of hurting John.

Are you hurting John?

Okay. Are they afraid you

might hurt them?

- Yup.

- Would you, Beth?

When would you do it?

- Night time.

- Okay. Why would you do at night time?

Because I don't like them seeing me do it,

but they can feel me do it.

And what would you

do to them, Beth?

- Stab them.

- Okay. What would you stab on them?

A knife.

The program you are about

to see was compiled

from the actual therapy tapes

of Dr. Ken Magid,

a clinical psychologist specializing

in the treatment of severely abused children

- children so traumatized

in the first years of life

that they do not bond

with other people.

They are children

who cannot love or accept love

- children without conscience

who can hurt or even kill without remorse.

This film shows the devastating effects

of abuse on a child.

It also shows that

victims can be helped.

It is the story of

a six-and-a-half year old girl named Beth.

Do you ever stick

pins in people?

- Who?

- My brother.

- Okay. Do you do it a little bit or a lot?

- A lot.

Okay. And what are you trying to do

to your brother?

- Kill him.

- Why do you want your brother to die?

Because I was hurt so bad and I don't

want to be around people.

Okay. Who else would you like to

stick pins into?

- Mommy and daddy. - What would you

like to have happened to them?

Die.

Tim is the minister of a small

Methodist church in the south.

He and his wife Julie had been

married for twelve years.

Unable to have children of their own,

they decided to adopt.

In February of 1984, they received a call

from the Department of Social Services

telling them they had two children

available for adoption.

They were told that Beth, 19 months old,

and her brother Jonathan, 7 months old,

were normal and healthy.

We did not need children

to make our lives complete.

We've got security in ourselves and

security in our relationship, but we

wanted to share that with somebody else,

and we felt like we had a lot to pass on

to a child, and that was what we really

wanted to do and when the phone call came,

it was like, "At last it's here!"

And we think like a miracle

what happened, was so quick.

We'd heard of couples that

had to wait 5, 10 years on... on a child,

and here we had two young children, and

it was like they answered to our dream.

Their dream became a nightmare when they

realized that Beth and Jonathan had

severe emotional problems.

We had the kids with us...

Beth and her younger

brother John for... probably a couple of

months until we began to learn something

about their background and their past,

and when we learned it... something's

seemed to fall into place about

her behavior and John's behavior...

From several sources, we discovered that...

that they didn't have enough food to eat...

that perhaps even Beth went all day

maybe with just a box of kix cereal.

John himself was found in a bassinet

with whole patches appearing

all over him and a dirty diaper

and a couple of bottles at his feet.

They had curdled milk and the back

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