DeSantis signs bill to compensate victims of abuse in Florida schools

Governor Ron DeSantis on Friday approved a process that will allow hundreds of elderly men – the so-called White House Boys – to seek compensation for the beatings and rapes they suffered as children in state care.

The governor has signed the Dozier School for Boys and Okeechobee School Victim Compensation Act (HB 21), according to State Senator Darryl Rouson (D-St. Petersburg), one of the bill's sponsors.

The measure provides $20 million to be distributed among an estimated 400 survivors of “physical, mental or sexual abuse” that occurred between 1940 and 1975 at the two now-closed facilities.

“I want to thank the governor and the leadership of the Senate and House for providing some closure to these men who have been coming to Tallahassee for decades and telling their stories,” Rouson said in a phone interview Friday.

“Money cannot compensate them for the actual harm they suffered and witnessed, but it goes a long way toward closing the case and I am finally glad that we have a law that gives them the opportunity to recover their damages,” added Rouson, who worked on the bill for years.

As men, the White House Boys told their story

Investigators had concluded that nearly 100 boys had died in Dozier, a town in Marianna, between 1900 and 1973. Archaeologists from the University of South Florida spent four years exhuming remains from 55 unmarked graves in overgrown woods on the abandoned campus.

The Florida State Legislature officially apologized to the survivors of the abuse seven years ago, but attempts to provide compensation repeatedly failed until this year.

Apology accepted: Survivors of the Dozier School for Boys want the state to pay

Ground radar used: Search for bodies at Dozier School for Boys continues after initial tests fail

“They kept throwing obstacles in our path, but we didn't give up,” retired Army Ranger Captain Bryan Middleton said shortly after the bill passed the Senate in March. “They kicked our asses, but in the end we beat them. That's all. That's one of the greatest feelings.”

Middleton was held at Dozier from 1959 to 1961. He received the Purple Heart in the Vietnam War and after his retirement, he and Jerry Cooper and other victims founded the White House Boys Survivors Organization, named after the building where the abuse took place. They formed in 2005 to demand recognition and justice for the abuse.

“What they did to us makes you sick,” Cooper, who died in 2022, said in an interview with the USA TODAY Network-Florida in 2020.

Cooper, a star quarterback, said a Dozier official hit him 136 times with a belt and threatened him with five years in prison if he did not agree to play football for Dozier. The night he died, his wife, Babs, told him about a nightmare he had had.

“He was back in that bed (with that) belt,” she said, calling out the name of the man who beat him 61 years ago as memorial sculptures for the victims were unveiled at the Dozier site.

About 400 people are entitled to compensation for Dozier abuse

An estimated 400 men are eligible to receive money from the school's victim compensation program. But time is running out: former students of the Dozier School and Okeechobee School must submit a notarized compensation application by December 31 at the latest.

Rouson championed the reparations bill for eight years, six of which were led by current Senator Traci Davis (D-Jacksonville) when she served in the House of Representatives.

Before the start of the 2024 legislative session, Rouson said the psychological injuries the men suffered as students in state care were still present, calling them “the walking dead.”

In the Senate, he told his colleagues that support for the compensation bill “gives credibility to the voices of children whose cries of anguish have gone unheard.”

After the compensation bill was passed by Parliament, Davis said the money does not heal the pain the boys endured, nor can it undo the state's mistakes. “But it does help to get the resources and help you need at age 70 or 80 to end your life better than you started it.”

More: White House Boys are grateful for Dozier memorial but continue to seek justice

Jim Rosica contributed reporting. James Call is a member of the USA TODAY NETWORK-Florida Capital Bureau. Reach him at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @CallTallahassee.

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DeSantis signs bill to compensate victims of abuse in Florida schools

As men, the White House Boys told their story

About 400 people are entitled to compensation for Dozier abuse

Anna Harden

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As men, the White House Boys told their story

About 400 people are entitled to compensation for Dozier abuse

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