HANCOCK - “To cast the whole school in some idea that this was some torture chamber is just so far over the top,” Lisa Peebles, a criminal defense attorney representing Paul Geer, said. Geer is a former teacher and choir director at the now-closed Family Foundation School. “People aren’t happy with their lives; they’re looking to blame,” Peebles continued.
Geer, 56, was arrested April 3 on six federal criminal charges, accused of coercing and enticing children — students from the school — to travel across state lines to rape or sexually abuse them. He is also accused of disciplining students, tantamount to torture, according to a press release issued by the United States Criminal Justice Department. The discipline included depriving students of food, forcing them to eat their own vomit, binding them in rugs and leaving them in isolated rooms for extended periods of time, and forcing them to perform physical labor.
Federal prosecutors said Geer abused his position of authority at the private boarding school to exploit students, perpetuating a cycle of abuse that was concealed by the school’s administration. The indictment follows years of legal battles and investigations into the school’s practices and the conduct of its staff.
The private boarding school, operated on Chapel Hill Road in Hancock from the 1980s until 2014, was marketed to parents of “troubled” teenagers — those with nonconformity behavioral issues and drug or alcohol use — as a rehabilitative sanctuary complete with counseling, therapy, athletics and extracurricular activities in addition to academics.
Behind the façade of the campus, on a dead end road eight miles from the nearest town, a saga of sexual, physical and psychological abuse spanning decades has unfolded.
The school was founded by Tony (Anthony) and Betty Argiros. He, a gambling addict, and she, an alcoholic, fostered children for the Delaware County Department of Social Services, according to media reports and the school’s former website. Several alumni, including Devin Corvino and Liz Ianelli, said Tony Argiros was also a self-proclaimed sex addict.
Foster care can be challenging and rewarding, but also lucrative. Depending on the child in foster care, foster parents in upstate New York receive a monthly stipend of up to $1,123.01 for each child age 12 and up as of March 2024, according to the state Office of Children and Family Services.
Experienced as foster care parents, the Argiros transitioned into a private boarding school, using the tenets of a 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous program as the foundation of a method of providing paid care for children — the Family Foundation School. The Family Foundation School promised hope and rehabilitation to families frustrated with their child’s behavior and unequipped or ill-equipped to navigate the challenges of raising a rebellious teenager.
The reality was much different, according to former students and staff who say the school was a regime of terror. The school, which charged New York City metro-area families up to $82,000 per year, became a breeding ground for abuse marked by systematic cover-ups and financial maneuvering to evade accountability, according to former students, staff and court documents.
Over 150 former students of the school have died, many due to drug overdoses and suicide, according to ’08 alumnus Devin Corvino, 34, who tracks deaths of former students with the help of other alumni. The number of deaths by suicide of former students, including substance use overdose, is statistically high compared to the number of students that attended the school each year.
At the height of enrollment, each of the eight “families” comprised 25–30 students. The school operated for approximately 30 years with varied enrollment numbers.
Following a “truth campaign” alleging abuse at the school, the Family Foundation School, having been renamed Allynwood Academy in 2013, closed in 2014. Emmanuel “Mike” Argiros — son of Tony and Betty, and husband of Cindy Ray Argiros — who with Mike, worked at the school, and eventually operated the school together — said the closure was due to financial struggles according to a letter sent to staff at the time. The letter also stated that the administration was looking into continuing the program at a different location.
12 Months of Terror
Corvino recounts his time at the school as “12 months of terror,” a judgment echoed by many alumni of the school. Since alumnus Jon Martin-Crawford accused the school of abusing students in 2008 testimony to Congress, hundreds of alumni have shared stories of emotional, physical and sexual abuse that they say occurred at the school.
“Forcing me to eat my own vomit in front of my family unit while they all cheered me on was certainly the worst thing that happened to me,” former student Miranda Sullivan said. “The worst thing I experienced was watching Tom Malkowski die during breakfast.”
Sullivan attended the school from September 2003 until April 2004 when she turned 18 and was able to leave. Sullivan said she went on a two-week hunger strike when she first arrived but eventually had no choice but to comply, eating moldy tuna and its resulting vomit.
Alumni report a strong emphasis on sexual purity at the school, with students frequently punished for flirting and masturbating. Corvino recalled many instances of other students accused of having “impure” thoughts about the opposite sex.
“They [school staff] were all about purity,” he said. Students were publicly humiliated and shamed by other students in the “family” with verbal taunts and chants and forced to admit to things they did not think or do. Staff and administrators were obsessed with the topic of sex, Corvino said. Accused of flirting with a fellow student, Corvino said he was “brought up” for a “table topic” and publicly shamed for associating with a girl in his class who had come from his school in Long Island. He also said he was forced to list the sexual partners he had in a “confession” to his mother and further admit that he was “wrong” for engaging in sexual activity.
Sullivan recalled a field trip to a pool where staff put female students on their shoulders to “chicken fight.” She said she was uncomfortable being in a swimsuit around male staff, but her discomfort grew when she was later punished by staff, including Mike Argiros, for causing a male staff member to become sexually aroused.
Classmates, Corvino said, participated in the berating to deflect attention away from themselves in the event they found themselves in a similar situation. They turned on each other to protect themselves against similar public humiliation and shunning.
Liz Ianelli, who attended the school from 1994 until 1997, wrote a book about her experience at the school titled, “I See You, Survivor: Life Inside (and Outside) the Totally F*cked-Up Troubled Teen Industry.” Students, including Ianelli, recount punitive measures including “table topics” where students were publicly humiliated during meals. The practice included peers chastising each other, often with false accusations, according to alumni accounts.
Punishments, termed “sanctions,” included social isolation known as “blackout,” restricted diets of canned tuna, physical labor, and solitary confinement. Some alumni reported extreme measures like being wrapped in duct-taped blankets for days. Behaviors triggering sanctions ranged from talking to a member of the opposite sex to criticizing the school.
“Some of the techniques that were used long ago when the school first started would not be accepted practices in today’s world, but what they’re claiming in some of these instances are way over the top exaggerated,” Peebles said.
Ianelli, in her book, describes an occasion in which she and five other girls were asked by Tony Argiros to each choose one of six kittens. Once the girls chose their kitten, they were forced to drown them in the lake on campus, according to Ianelli’s book.
Many students attempted to run away from the school, not easy considering the rural location of the school almost nine miles away from a McDonald’s in Hancock where runaway students often hid in the bathroom. The children who were found by law enforcement trekking state Route 97 were returned to the school. Corvino said he ran away while on a school trip to Washington D.C. supervised by Geer, but was eventually found by police and returned to the school. Following his escape attempt, staff confiscated his shoes, as they did with all runaways, Corvino explained, to discourage future attempts to escape.
Many students attempted another means of escape — suicide. Ianelli writes in her book that she attempted suicide by drinking a bottle of vinegar, mistaking it for bleach. In 2004, a 17-year-old Tom Malkowski completed suicide at the campus by jumping from a balcony.
“He’s perpetually dying in my peripheral vision,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan said she did not know Malkowski well, but often watched him in the halls as she envied a jacket that he usually wore.
“I really felt like I should have gone out there, and I don’t know what I could have done, but I could have supported the kid in some way,” Sullivan said, “but since I froze I won’t forgive myself.”
Child Victims Act Spurs Litany of Lawsuits
Despite the abundance of testimony describing the abuses that took place at the school, many people continued to disregard the stories as dramatizations by “bad kids,” and mentally ill and/or troubled alumni; however lawsuits and criminal charges against staff members like Geer have brought the dark chapter into the spotlight. Geer’s case only adds to the growing litany of legal battles facing the Argiros family and their affiliates. At least four lawsuits have been filed against the school and Argiros in Delaware County alone.
Geer, who worked at the school from 1991 to 2014, has been deposed in previous lawsuits that were discontinued by agreement or settlement, or are still ongoing. Several other former staff members of the school have also been named in lawsuits related to sexual abuse that allegedly occurred at the school. Many of the accusations were made possible by the New York Child Victims Act which extended the statute of limitations for sexual abuse for a limited period.
In 2017, a Child Victims Act case was filed alleging that Curtis Newsome, a counselor at the school, sexually abused a woman while she was a student there, beginning in 2013. During a deposition relating to the case, Jan Cheripko, a former teacher and family leader, stated that he believed Geer was sexually abusing students and told an administrator that Geer should be fired.
According to Cheripko’s deposition transcript, the administrator of the school said, “Paul [Geer] was a gifted choir director and teacher and his work with students and getting them to perform was something that they valued.” Cherpiko said he most likely spoke to Rita Argiros who was the program director at the time and is the daughter of founders Betty and Tony Argiros.
As Sullivan recalls, many students believed Geer was abusing their peers and one student advised Sullivan not to join choir because of that.
“I’m grateful to her for the rest of my life,” Sullivan said.
Geer was not fired and continued to work at the school until its closure.
In the same deposition, Cheripko stated he learned of two staff members who were fired prior to his employment there in 2000 — Ken Rivers for allegations of sexual misconduct and Sal Guarino for an inappropriate verbal proposition.
A 2023 lawsuit alleges that Geer sexually abused the plaintiff from 1997 through 1999 and that a staff member, Audra Runge Towsley, “violated” the plaintiff during a strip search.
In a discontinued 2021 lawsuit against the school, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany, St. Paul the Apostle Church and the UHS Binghamton Hospital, a former student alleges that he was raped by the school’s chaplain and dean of students, Stephen Morris. The student also alleges that educator Mary Hanstine repeatedly touched his genitals during study sessions.
In 2020, a case that remains active was filed accusing another chaplain of the school, Anthony Moore, of sexual abuse occurring in 1986 through 1987.
In her book, Ianelli says that while working in the kitchen of the school, the cook raped her multiple times. She writes that when she reported her rape, she was punished for “seducing” the man. Her punishment involved her being duct taped in a blanket and left in solitary confinement for eight days, according to Ianelli.
In 2020, former student Justin Tataglia, now 46, sued the school and Emmanuel (Mike) Argiros individually and as CEO, for alleged abuses. In documents filed with the Delaware County Clerk, Tataglia states that he was forced by the school, under Argiros’ direction and leadership, to shovel snow from the driveway with a spoon and sweep the school’s rooftop from 5 a.m. to sunset.
As part of the same lawsuit, Tataglia states that he was tasked with kitchen duty at the school where staff member Guy Matthews — who worked as a cook — would grind his erect penis into Tataglia’s back while Tataglia worked in the kitchen. Tataglia also alleged in the lawsuit that Geer rubbed Tataglia’s genitals after inviting him to watch a movie.
Changing Names,
Shifting Assets
Facing mounting lawsuits, the school’s name was systematically altered from The Family School to the Family Foundation School, to Education Plus Corp., and to Allynwood Academy. Real estate was also shifted into the name of Chapel Hill Land Holdings, LLC, a trust, according to filings at the Delaware County Clerk’s Office. Mike and Cindy Ray Argiros continue to have extensive business interests in Hancock, including Kasos Enterprises, Kasos Associates, Kasos, Inc., The Hancock Herald, The Upper Delaware Inn, Smith’s Colonial Motel and the recently sold Capra Cinemas. These business ventures have woven them deeply into the fabric of the community. When asked to comment about the happenings at the school, Cindy Ray Argiros declined to comment. Mike Argiros did not respond to a request to comment. Betty Argiros, when asked July 9 to comment on the allegations and lawsuit responded, “I don’t wanna talk about it.”
Despite these tactics, former students and advocates remain resolute in their pursuit of justice against those they say mishandled them.
Geer has pleaded innocent to the allegations, and his federal criminal case is ongoing. On June 28, Geer waived speedy trial requirements to prepare a defense and is being held in federal detention without bail. On April 12, the judge presiding over the criminal case against Geer said, after reviewing a request for Geer’s possible release, he found “no condition or combination of condition would mitigate the risk of the Defendant’s [Geer’s] further efforts to prey on vulnerable children or assure the safety of other person’s in the communty”.
The federal charges against Geer signify a pivotal moment in the students’ quest for justice, offering a glimmer of hope to those who endured years of suffering.
This is part one of a three-part series delving into systematic abuse carried out with the complicity of numerous residents, business owners, law enforcement and mandated reporters in Hancock and Delaware County. Listen to our reporter’s interview on The Reporter’s podcast ‘Off the Record,’ at the-reporter.net and all podcast platforms, wherever you listen.
