Paris Hilton burst into tears this week as she testified to a panel of Utah politicians about being chronically abused at a boarding school there.
“My name is Paris Hilton. I am a survivor of institutional abuse, ”said the 39-year-old socialite at a state Senate committee hearing on the Utah Capitol on Monday.
Hilton, 39, wiped her tears as she testified about her alleged abuse at 17 at the Provo Canyon School in Beehive State, which she dubbed “hell itself on earth”.
“I was abused verbally, mentally and physically on a daily basis,” Hilton said of her time when “it was no longer Paris”, but just a few.
“I was isolated from the outside world and stripped of all my human rights,” she said, accusing the team of being “bad and sadistic”.
“I cried myself to sleep every night, praying to wake up from this nightmare,” she said at the hearing.
Hilton – who previously discussed abuse in a documentary, “This is Paris” – said her 11 months at the so-called compassionate behavior center have caused ongoing trauma.
“For the past 20 years, I had a recurring nightmare in which I was kidnapped in the middle of the night by two strangers, searched and locked up in a facility,” she testified.
“I wish I could tell you that this scary nightmare was just a dream, but it is not,” she said, saying she feared that they “would never leave.”
She said she was “forced to take drugs that left me numb and exhausted” and “did not breathe fresh air or see sunlight for 11 months”.
“Privacy was zero – every time I used the bathroom or showered – it was monitored,” she testified.
“At 16 – as a child – I felt his penetrating eyes fixed on my naked body. I was just a child and I felt violated every day, ”she said, calling it“ unconstitutional, degrading and scary ”.
She claimed that a longtime employee – who was employed until her documentary was aired – would boast to recent students that “it was she who broke Paris Hilton”.
Hilton said at the hearing that “talking about something so personal was and still is scary”, but she wanted to bring about changes to prevent others from being mistreated in the same way.
Hilton’s testimony was to support a bill to require more government oversight of residential treatment centers for young people and to require them to document when they use restrictions.
The move was unanimously approved after the emotional testimony of Hilton and several other survivors.
Hilton called on President Biden and Congressional leaders to act and said he plans to seek federal legislation.
“This is just the first step,” Hilton told reporters. “This law will definitely help many children, but there is obviously more work to do and I will not stop until the change happens.”
In a statement on its website, Provo Canyon School says that previous owners sold the school in 2000.
Associate administrator Tim Marshall told KUTV that the school supported the project and “eliminated the use of seclusion or isolation for some time”. He also insisted that the team “do not use drugs to sedate, immobilize the patient or restrict him in his ability to continue to be actively involved in his care”.
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