Launched last year on a farm in Clackamas County, Ore., the Ecclesia Athletic Association camp professed a wholesome purpose. Founder Eldridge J. Broussard Jr., once a basketball star at Pacific University, said Ecclesia, an outgrowth of the Watts Christian Center in Los Angeles, would bring ghetto children into the clean rural setting and train them through a disciplined program of athletics.
In time, however, neighbors noticed that the children, as one observer said, were "like zombies, never talking, never laughing." The neighbors asked the Oregon children's services division to investigate, but to no avail. Last week four adults came to the...
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