Rape alleged after children sneak out of Spokane youth center

A 13-year-old boy allegedly raped a 10-year-old girl in an abandoned trailer after they sneaked out of a treatment center for troubled children and teens.

The incident happened Friday night and is under investigation by the Spokane Police Department. Court documents say the boy could face two charges of first-degree child rape.

The victim had been living at Excelsior Youth Center, 3754 W. Indian Trail Road, for about a month after she was removed from her mother’s custody and placed under the state’s protection, according to court documents. She and another girl, who is 12, sneaked out Friday night and walked to an abandoned trailer home a quarter-mile up the road.

They told detectives that the boy joined them sometime later and raped the 10-year-old. All three children then went to a nearby grocery store and returned to the trailer, where he raped her again, according to court documents. The two girls reported the assault to Excelsior staff on Saturday morning.

Excelsior is a nonprofit that contracts with the state to treat young people for substance abuse, mental health and behavioral issues. More than 100 clients are treated on an outpatient basis, while about 55 live at the facility.

The clients, who range in age from 10 to 21, aren’t there as a result of criminal behavior. Many come from difficult living situations or have been traumatized in the past.

Excelsior CEO Andrew Hill said staff members are working with the alleged rape victim to help her feel safe, and the boy is in juvenile detention.

Hill also pointed to what he called an “uncomfortable” fact: Under state law, Excelsior staff can’t stop children from leaving the facility.

“We don’t have some cut-and-dry rules to prevent this from happening,” he said. “We’re working within a system of regulations and state laws that don’t allow us to employ some of the same restrictions that maybe a parent would. We don’t have the ability to restrain the child.”

The laws regarding children who are wards of the state are murky and don’t make enough distinctions based on age, Hill said. Treatment centers like Excelsior need “legislative clarification” that would allow them to be more proactive in protecting children, he said.

“Whenever these youths leave the campus, they’re at an extremely high risk of being victimized,” he said. “They’re an incredibly vulnerable population in our society.”

Hill said Excelsior has been working with police and other agencies to establish policies that deter children from running away.

“We see these kids not as Excelsior’s kids, but the community’s kids,” he said.

In 2014, then-City Attorney Nancy Isserlis wrote that Excelsior was “the largest single consumer of law enforcement resources for the Spokane Police Department,” drawing roughly 110 calls for service each month.

Most of those calls were for reported runaways, but police also were concerned about assaults on staff members, clients who hurt themselves and crimes in the area possibly committed by Excelsior clients. A 2014 investigation by the state Department of Health, however, found no deficiencies in Excelsior’s practices.

“The staff at the center are a committed group,” Hill said. “They do some of the hardest work there is to do in this community.”

Excelsior’s caseload has grown significantly in recent years as it offers more services and as more children are diverted from hospitals during mental health episodes, he said. Few other treatment centers in the region fall into the same category. Others include Northwest Children’s Home in Lewiston and the Ryther facility in Seattle.