Special ed director said to siphon $10m, State alleges unwarranted pay, perks at regional agency

The Boston Globe
June 22, 2011
Michael Rezendes

The former director of the Merrimack Special Education Collaborative is facing allegations that he fleeced the publicly funded organization, set up to provide education services to special needs children, of more than $10 million while paying himself, a former girlfriend, and a handful of top staff extravagant salaries and bonuses.

In letters mailed Monday, Gregory W. Sullivan, the state’s inspector general, said that John B. Barranco also racked up more than $50,000 in personal expenses on a credit card issued by a related nonprofit organization, including tickets to the Kentucky Derby, improvements to vacation homes in New Hampshire and Florida, Christmas gifts for a daughter, luxury clothes, and nearly $16,000 in gasoline, purchased from 2003 through 2010.

“This is one of the most outrageous abuses this office has ever seen,’’ Sullivan told the Globe. “Both of these entities were created to help educate children with special needs. Instead, top officials have been helping themselves to high salaries, inflated pensions, lavish parties, and personal expenses, all on the taxpayer’s dime.’’

In addition, Sullivan said Barranco used deception to increase his teacher’s pension to $157,000 while collecting an inflated salary and bonuses from the nonprofit. Barranco’s total compensation from the nonprofit exceeded $500,000 in 2009.

To help pay for the exorbitant salaries, Barranco siphoned tax dollars from the 10 school districts in northern Massachusetts that belonged to the collaborative through the related nonprofit organization under his control, the Merrimack Education Center, which charged the collaborative inflated prices for office space and other administrative services.

Sullivan has recommended that the collaborative sever its financial ties with the nonprofit and demand $11.5 million in repayment. In addition, he has told the Teachers Retirement System that he does not believe Barranco is entitled to the pension he is receiving.

The retirement system has moved to reduce Barranco’s pension, and Barranco has appealed the action.

Barranco did not respond to numerous calls for comment, but a public relations firm defended the quality of the services provided by the nonprofit.

Attorney General Martha Coakley, who has jurisdiction over public corruption cases and nonprofit organizations, is reviewing Sullivan’s findings and has the authority to launch a criminal investigation.

“Our office takes allegations of the misappropriation of funds very seriously,’’ said Brad Puffer, Coakley’s spokesman.

In addition, Sullivan’s findings could prompt action by federal authorities, including the Internal Revenue Service, which also has jurisdiction over tax-exempt organizations.

Bipolar diagnosis jumps in young children: study

Ros Krasny
(Reuters)
BOSTON

Fri Jan 15, 2010

BOSTON (Reuters) - The number of children aged 2 to 5 who have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and prescribed powerful antipsychotic drugs has doubled over the past decade, according to research released on Friday.

Health

The research suggests that while it is still rare to prescribe powerful psychiatric drugs to 2-year-olds, the practice is becoming more frequent.

The data, compiled from 2000 to 2007, and published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, could inform testimony at the upcoming Boston-area murder trials of the parents of 4-year-old Rebecca Riley. The girl died of an overdose of mood-stabilizing medication in 2006.

A Boston child psychiatrist, Kayoko Kifuji, diagnosed Riley with bipolar disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder when she was 30 months old, and placed her on several powerful drugs: Depakote, an antiseizure medication also used for bipolar disorder, and clonidine, a blood pressure medication.

Kifuji's testimony may be crucial to the fate of Michael and Carolyn Riley, who face first-degree murder charges. A grand jury and a review by the state's medical licensing board cleared the doctor of wrongdoing.

Prosecutors claim the Rileys deliberately overmedicated their daughter to subdue her. The couple say they were following Kifuji's instructions and their daughter died of pneumonia.

The case has shone the spotlight again on a debate within the psychiatric profession about whether bipolar disorder can be diagnosed in very young children and whether it is wise to prescribe powerful medications.

BIPOLAR TODDLERS?

Bipolar disorder, characterized by severe mood swings, was once thought to emerge only during adolescence or later. But Dr. Joseph Biederman, a child psychiatrist at Harvard University, transformed views on the subject by arguing that children could have the disorder at extremely young ages.

He is credited with spearheading a more than 40-fold increase in the number of children diagnosed with bipolar disorder over the past decade.

Biederman was accused in 2008 by Republican U.S. Senator Charles Grassley of failing to fully disclose payments by drug companies, including some that produced medication for bipolar disorder. Biederman declined to be interviewed about the latest study.

"The psychiatric diagnosis of very young children is anything but an exact science," said Harry Tracy, a psychologist and publisher of NeuroInvestment, a monthly publication specializing in central nervous system disorders.

"Such disparate causes as ADHD, depression, bipolar disorder, sexual abuse, and family dysfunction can produce very similar symptoms in a toddler."

The report's author, Mark Olfson, professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University, said about 1.5 percent of all privately insured children between the ages of 2 and 5, or one in 70 children, received some sort of psychotropic drug -- whether an antipsychotic, a mood stabilizer, a stimulant or an antidepressant -- in 2007.

If a child is diagnosed with bipolar disorder between the ages of 2 and 5, about half are prescribed an antipsychotic, such as Eli Lilly & Co's Zyprexa, AstraZeneca Plc's Seroquel, and Johnson & Johnson's Risperdal. They are prescribed to about one in 3,000 2-year-olds, according to his report.

"There might be a role for these drugs but only after you've tried other interventions, with the parents, or with the parents and child together, but that is not happening when you examine the billing records," Olfson said.

(Additional reporting by Toni Clarke; Editing by Peter Cooney)