Evidence of undocumented deaths at shut Florida School for Boys — 31 crosses at school cemetery, but 50 grave shafts; 98 died between 1911 and 1973

The Dozier Home for Boys in Marianna opened as the Florida State Reform School on Jan. 1, 1900, operating until June 30, 2011, when the state Department of Juvenile Justice shut it down after years of controversy over physical and sexual abuse of its charges.

Men who were incarcerated there described being whipped with a metal-lined leather strap, sometimes leading to unconsciousness. Some said they were taken to the “rape room,” where they said officers sodomized boys of their choosing.
     Biennial reports to state lawmakers early in the 20th century “often listed fewer deaths than what is listed in the school ledgers,” the report said.
     Changes in state law and policy that allowed “incorrigible” children and even orphans to be sent to the reform school, and required longer sentences for inmates, suggest “that financial incentives were underlying motivating factors” for the youth prison’s operation, the report said. In 1906, for example, a superintendent complained he lacked adequate prisoners to harvest the corn crop.
     Children put out to work were overseen by local labor bosses, who were given broad authority to punish the children as they saw fit, said Kimmerle.

There may be even more victims because privacy laws have limited access to records after 1960 and overgrowth on the grounds has hindered full searches.

• Seven boys are believed to have died following escape attempts, according to the report.
• Among the children who were overlooked was a white boy named Thomas Curry, who died of blunt head trauma. Records claimed he died away from the campus after he escaped.
• The school records claim that boys who escaped happened to meet a violent death, including two who died of gunshot wounds to the chest or head.