YOUTH SUICIDES
2008-2012*
Confirmed suicides for ages 11-19, according to the Montgomery County Coroner’s Office. The Montgomery County Coroner’s Office serves a 21-county area.
Age Number of suicides
Younger than 15 7
15 years old 7
16 years old 7
17 years old 12
18 years old 9
19 years old 15
* Data through April 2012
Source: Montgomery County Coroner’s Office
Eleven-year-old Kamden Ketchell liked baseball and was looking forward to his Little League team’s opening game.
Thirteen-year-old Paul Hauan was just a month removed from a family vacation to Florida, where he rode the Space Mountain roller coaster at Disney World.
Thirteen-year-old Dylan Roach was a Boy Scout who had recently been inducted into the National Honor Society.
Each was a special kid who left behind few clues that something was wrong — something they couldn’t live with.
The apparent suicides of these area middle school students this spring has school districts evaluating the effectiveness of bullying programs and setting up anonymous tip lines.
The families are left looking for answers.
“I wouldn’t want my worst enemy to go through this. He was my only son. Our family name and lineage died with him,” said James Ketchell Jr., Kamden’s father.
The youths didn’t know each other but are bound in death. They represent an emerging — and deeply disturbing — local trend of younger and younger children taking their own lives.
“It used to be rare to see a suicide under age 15, now we’re seeing a lot of attempts by 11- and 12-year-olds,” said Tricia Marks, president and CEO of the Dayton-area based Suicide Prevention Center Inc. “It hasn’t been a huge jump, but it’s something very disturbing.”
The Suicide Prevention Center answers about 4,000 calls a month. Marks said nearly one-quarter of the calls are coming from adolescents and young adults younger than 22. The trend she’s noted, younger children are moving from suicidal gestures — like scratching a wrist or taking multiple aspirins — to more lethal methods that leave little time for intervention.
Autopsies still are pending on the three young deaths in Montgomery, Preble and Champaign counties, but police reports indicate:
• Hauan of Riverside died from an apparent gunshot wound at 8:10 p.m. on May 21.
• Roach of Eaton shot himself with his father’s gun on May 12.
• Ketchell of Cable in Champaign County died April 28 from an apparent hanging.
The Dayton Daily News reached out to the boys’ families, their schools, police and experts in adolescent behavior and suicide prevention to try to gain some understanding about why children so young would end their lives. None of the boys left suicide notes. Rumors of bullying by the community at-large circulated after every death.
Simple explanations seem elusive in each of the deaths.
Nationally, suicide is — and has been for the past decade — relatively rare for youths from ages 5 to 14, compared to adults, just 0.7 per 100,000.
“The younger you go, the more rare it is,” said Jill Harkavy-Friedman, senior director of research and prevention for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
But, in its 2011 Youth Risk Behavioral Report for Ohio, the Centers for Disease Control reported that one in seven Ohio students said they had “seriously considered suicide” in the past 12 months. Slightly more than one in seven actually had “made a plan to commit suicide” during that time.
Additionally, one in 11 students reported “attempting suicide one or more times in the past 12 months,” nearly 50 percent higher than the national average.
It’s impossible to know exactly how many children have attempted suicide because many attempts go unreported. However, records obtained by the Dayton Daily News point to hundreds of adolescents in the region who either threatened or attempted suicide since January 2011.
Data from Kettering Health Network showed 300 attempted suicides by 13- to 22-year-olds treated in its emergency rooms in 2011 — 177 females and 123 males. This includes 80 who were 15 and younger.
So far this year, the network reported treating 126 attempted suicides in the same age group — 31 were 15 or younger.
Dr. Andrew Khavari of the Kettering Behavioral Medical Center said puberty is a dividing line.
“Once they’re adolescents, there’s a far greater incidence” of a suicide attempt, he said, citing the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
Records show there is no geographic distinction in where the children live. They are from the cities, suburbs and rural areas.
In Oakwood, a 14-year-old junior high student was hospitalized after ingesting poison on May 10. A parent and police reported that bullying may have been a contributing factor.
In Kettering, police reports show officers have transported 11 teens to mental health treatment facilities because of drug overdoses or threatened suicides so far this year. The calls were made by parents, caregivers, physicians and crisis-care centers, according to Ronald Roberts, public information and school resource officer.
Calls to the Suicide Prevention Center have escalated after each of the local suicides. Children are making many of those calls.
“We’ve had a lot of kids calling in with guilt, saying they wished they had done something,” Marks said. “We tell them, ‘Listen to your friend.’ If a friend makes a threat, never keep it a secret.”
A smart kid
Paul Hauan, an eighth-grade student at Mad River Middle School, was a smart kid and had earned straight A’s last year. The image of his mother, he was small in stature, wore glasses and was losing his hair because of a condition called Alopecia areata.
“He told us, last year, that he didn’t like being in the school because kids were bigger and that they were mean,” said Lisa Noland, Paul’s mother. “We tried to pull him out of the school, but they told us we couldn’t unless we moved.”
Noland now clings to the memories of their family vacation in April at Daytona Beach and Disney World. During the trip, Paul convinced his mom to buy him a shirt that read, “I’m too sexy for my hair. That’s why it isn’t there.”
She took off work early on May 21 to take Paul to a doctor’s appointment. On the way home, they talked about his upcoming freshman year at Stebbins High School, and Noland promised to help him buy a car when he was old enough to drive. He became secretive after receiving a text message as they arrived home, she said.
“He told me it was from his grandmother, but I know now that it wasn’t,” Noland said.
Riverside police were called to the family home just after 8 p.m. They found Paul on the floor of his bedroom, a gun belonging to his mother’s fiance — that Noland thought had been safely hidden — was lying near his body.
“I didn’t know that he even knew about the gun,” Noland said.
News of the death spread swiftly around the school community, via Facebook and texting. Facebook posts falsely claimed Paul had cancer. There also were claims of bullying. Protesters rallied at the school on May 24, carrying signs that said, “Stop the bullying.”
“We’re very concerned that this child did take his own life. This was a special little boy and he’s gone,” Jenny Birtle, communications director for Mad River Schools said. “If there are issues of bullying, we want students to know they can come to us — that we’ll take it seriously.”
Cheyenne Young, 13, also a seventh-grader at the middle school, learned about Paul’s passing on Facebook. She and Paul had been early arrivers at school and sometimes talked as they waited for the morning bell.
“I didn’t want to believe it,” Cheyenne said.
She and her mother, Charline Subler, read the Facebook entries about Paul together.
“I think bullying is bad at our school. It’s mean, real mean,” said Young, adding that she had no knowledge of bullying directed at Paul.
Subler said she would welcome more anti-bullying programs at the school, but that it’s also a community problem and more parents need to get involved.
Police and school officials say there were no reports that Paul had been bullied. Riverside Deputy Chief Michael Brown said officers have spoken with the boy’s family and friends, and questioned other students.
“No one has come forward, other than on Facebook. The rumor mill just grew,” Brown said.
Noland believes the answers may be found in that text message.
“Somebody made him feel so terrible that he must not have felt he could go on,” she said. “I don’t know for sure, but I believe that text message had something to do with it.”
Police confiscated her son’s laptop and his phone, and have yet to comment on the text message.
Brown said Riverside officers conducted an anti-bullying program at the middle school in February, which Paul likely attended. That program is ongoing. This fall, the district also will launch a web-based hot line where students can anonymously report bullying.
‘Bullying is running rampant in the schools’
Most school districts have a zero-tolerance policies against bullying, but more needs to be done, according to Marks, who conducts suicide prevention programs at schools around the region.
“Bullying is running rampant in the schools,” she said. “We hear it constantly.”
Experts say it’s most common during middle-school years, an extremely critical time for students’ emotional development.
“A lot of that conflict gets sorted out by high school,” Eaton Superintendent Brad Neavin said, adding that Facebook and other social networking sites have created a hazardous environment. “There’s a distance there that allows kids to be more cruel.”
The acts often can run under the radar, out of earshot of teachers and parents.
Marks believes that instead of suspending the bully — which often just makes the bullying more harsh and secretive — the individual and the victim should go through counseling, together.
“Anytime you have a kid with any kind of problem, you need to be an advocate,” Marks said. “If you just suspend a bully it’s not going to solve the problem.”
As we grow older, adults tend to forget what it was like to be a kid dealing with emotional issues. Never dismiss any of their concerns, no matter how small they may seem, Marks said.
“If a parent will sit down with a child and talk about their feelings, what a wonderful gift,” she said.
Khavari, who treats troubled 5- to 18-year-olds at Kettering Behavioral Medical Center, said that “developmentally, it’s normal for kids to be very secretive during their teenage years.
“In my experience, they do want to open up and share. They are often apprehensive about being punished,” said Khavari, a child and adolescent psychiatrist.
“Even if kids don’t want to talk, parents need to show an interest and keep the lines of communication open. That’s especially true if there are signs the child is struggling, withdrawing or exhibiting signs of depression or anxiety,” Khavari said.
Kids used to be able to escape schoolyard bullies, by going home. Now, with the use of cellphones and the explosion of Facebook, there is no escape.
“Social media can allow the bullying to follow the child home,” Khavari said. “I think the jury is still out on whether it has led to increased suicides. But when I work with families, I recommend that parents monitor their kids’ social media usage closely, have all the passwords and check it regularly. Getting involved soon if there’s a problem can make a big difference.”
“I think one of the best things parents and schools can do is help kids develop good coping skills and help them learn what support to access,” Marks said.
Three suicides in four years in rural county
Dylan Roach was a football player and Boy Scout. He recently was inducted into the National Honor Society.
He lived with his mother in Eaton but was spending the weekend at his father’s home, just outside the city, according to a Preble County Sheriff’s Office report.
That Saturday, the rest of the family left the house for a ballgame, leaving him alone. He was discovered about 11 a.m. by his stepmother, according to the report. When authorities arrived, his father and mother also were there, according to David Lindloff, a veteran detective and investigator for the Preble County Coroner’s Office.
Dylan’s father told investigators that his son was familiar with guns.
School officials said they have found no evidence of recent incidents of bullying, but Roach’s parents both told investigators at the scene that he had been bullied. “That’s what the parents said that day,” Lindloff said.
Dylan’s parents didn’t respond to requests by the Dayton Daily News for interviews.
While acknowledging bullying exists at the middle school, Superintendent Brad Neavin said, “We don’t have any direct knowledge of a particular bullying incident that led to this.”
Neavin said Dylan’s father had mentioned past problems, but lacked specifics needed to mount an investigation.
“(Dylan) actually had a good year,” Neavin said.
The district website lists its bullying and hazing policy, and a semi-annual report shows 18 verified reports at the middle school from Aug. 24, 2011-Dec. 21, 2011. The report for the latest six months wasn’t available last week.
Neavin said he hoped Roach’s parents would help with new programs next fall designed to deal with bullying and suicide prevention.
“We’re all working together to try to get through it,” he said.
Dylan was the only suicide victim in recent years attending Eaton schools. But, he is the third Preble County teen victim in four years, according to reports.
• On March 20, 2009, Cassie O. Gibson, 15, of Lewisburg, hung herself in her bedroom, according to a sheriff’s report. A note in Gibson’s left pocket said goodbye to family and friends.
She was living in her grandparents’ custody. They told investigators she had been suspended that day at school after threatening other students in an argument over a boyfriend.
“No other indicators were shared with officers,” according to the report.
• Alden B. Joyce, 16, also died by hanging, on April 2, 2008. The day before, Joyce, a student at National Trail High School in New Paris, began texting a friend while riding home from a track meet. “When he got off the bus, his eyes were welled up with tears,” the friend told investigators.
The messages continued after they went home, according to reports.
“There wasn’t one big thing in his life that made him do this,” the friend told investigators. He had broken up with a girlfriend and “recently got in trouble with the school for drinking.”
Fair haired, freckle-faced boy
James Ketchell described his son as a troubled boy who had difficulty making friends and suffered from anxiety. He had come from a split home and had been separated from his mother. His dad worried that may have given him a feeling of not fitting in.
The fair-haired, freckle-faced boy had risen early for Little League practice on an overcast Saturday — the team’s last before the season opener. Some of his teammates hadn’t shown up because of weather, so Kamden — a fifth-grader at Triad Middle School — had gotten extra one-on-one time with the coach. He even learned he was getting his favorite jersey number, 14.
“He was so excited,” his dad said. “The coach had told him he was doing a good job.”
After practice, Kamden and his family ate lunch and watched a movie together, then the father sent his son off to clean his room.
“Where should I put my dirty clothes?” were the boy’s last words to his father.
“There was no indication that anything was bothering him. That makes me think it could have been an accident,” the boy’s father said. “At first, I thought it was a joke. Obviously, it was not a joke.”
There had been an incident on the school bus involving Kamden and another student the day before he died. It was serious enough for him to share what happened with his sister, Alandria. They spoke to their dad, who contacted the school.
“They were going to look into it on Monday,” Ketchell said. “Could it have been a factor? I think a lot of things could have been factors.”
Bullying can trigger suicides, but it’s rarely the underlying cause, according to Harkavy-Friedman.
“Most people who are bullied do not kill themselves,” he said.
Craig Meredith, superintendent of Triad Local Schools, said the bus incident was investigated after Kamden’s death.
“Without Kamden, we weren’t able to substantiate how serious this was. The bus driver didn’t see it,” Meredith said. “Could it have been a factor? Of course it could.”
Middle school is a tough time for kids as they struggle to understand who they are and what they’re going to do with their lives.
Since Ketchell’s death, school administrators and teachers have re-evaluated the district’s anti-bullying program and have decided to take a different approach.
“We’re not sure anti-bullying is a message kids get. It’s so negative. Instead, we want to focus on behaviors we want to see in kids,” Meredith said.
On May 22, the Ohio House of Representatives passed a bill that would require teachers across the state to be trained in suicide prevention. Its chief sponsor was State Rep. Marlene Anielski, R-Walton Hills, of northeast Ohio, whose 18-year-old son killed himself in 2010. It was introduced on May 29 in the Ohio Senate.
It’s an idea Kamden’s family now advocates.
They also are setting up a nonprofit foundation in Kamden’s honor, with the mission of providing support to anyone who has suffered from depression, bullying, anger, split families, anxiety, low self-esteem/negative self-image, loneliness, suicide, inability to make friends.
“We wish to raise awareness,” Ketchell said. “We will never know in this lifetime what exactly led to our family’s tragedy. Kamden was not perfect. He was just a little boy with a big heart.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2362 or josmith @DaytonDailyNews.com.
About the Author
