After years of alleged abuse and five boys recently running away, a collective nightmare may finally be coming to an end

Larry and Carmen Musgrave, the owners of a Christian boarding school in Piedmont, Missouri, are now sitting in jail after being charged with kidnapping a former student.

(Follow above article link to view photos/PDFs tha accompany this article.)

According to the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office, the Musgraves were arrested Friday night at ABM Ministries (a.k.a. Lighthouse Christian Academy) following an investigation that began “several months ago.” The probe began following “several calls of runaways from the home” and many interviews with past students. Sheriff Dean Finch said “he anticipates more charges as the investigation continues.”

It’s not the first time a Christian boarding school in Missouri has come under fire for alleged bad behavior. In the past several years, there have been investigations into the “Circle of Hope Girls’ Ranch and Boarding School” and Agape Boarding School in the same state.

A lot of this happens because religious boarding schools in Missouri are largely unregulated, relying on their religious label to win the trust of unsuspecting families. These facilities assure parents their troublesome teenagers will receive a much-needed, faith-based rehabilitation if they simply hand over custody and pay a hefty fee. Instead of making things better, though, the Christian ranches often become a hotbed of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse that leave the kids far worse off than when they entered.

That also seems to be the case with Lighthouse Christian Academy.

Last month, reporters Laura Bauer and Judy L. Thomas of the Kansas City Star published a harrowing story about two children who escaped from the Christian school… and flagged down a random driver, Cierra Osborn, who took them in for safety.

Now, [Osborn] stood before two more runaways, ages 12 and 14, who had walked miles without coats in temperatures hovering between the high 30s and low 40s. Osborn said they told her that staff would often berate them and hit them for things like not getting their chores done fast enough.

“They were just terrified, they were shaking,” Osborn said. “I don’t know if it’s just because they were that cold or what.”

…

Community members have also been in contact with several former students, who say they were mentally, physically and sexually abused during their time at ABM Ministries in the past two decades.

Osborn also posted about that encounter on Facebook:

On my way home I saw two little boys screaming for help on the side of the road, when I stopped they were begging for someone to call 911 and were shaking because of how cold and scared they were, they had ran away from the ABM ministries boys home in black river retreat. the same boys home another little boy had ran from and was found cold in a ditch not long ago, I brought them home gave them food and water and blankets, we contacted the police. They said multiple times they needed help but didn’t want to go back to the boys home, they told me about the abuse they had been going through and how they get hit for doing simple things like not doing there jobs fast enough or messing up. I understand these boys are troubled boys and they can make up stuff but this is the third time hearing these things about this boys home and no child should have to go through this. My heart is breaking for these kids and I hope they get justice, the police didn’t ask any questions and as far as I know they aren’t taking any action on this. is there anything I can do to draw attention to this, I just believe they should be investigated or something!!!

One girl who attended the school nearly two decades ago when it was co-ed told The Star how she was forced to do manual labor, was physically abused, and placed in a literal chokehold. Those methods don’t appear to have changed.

That may be because the director of ABM Ministries is Julio Sandoval, whose previous job was—wait for it—dean of Agape Boarding School.1

Five boys have run away from the school since the beginning of 2024. (The sheriff told The Star that all five have since been returned home.)

It’s not clear why the arrests came now when former students said they had been telling their stories to law enforcement officials for years. Even after the two boys were picked up by Osborn last month, and residents told authorities about it, they were told “they didn’t provide enough information to meet the criteria to launch an investigation.”

Yet the sheriff’s office now says an active investigation was launched “several months ago.” The discrepancy isn’t explained.

It’s also unclear why the Musgraves were charged with “kidnapping.” (The footnote involved Sandoval may suggest a reason.)

Either way, when law enforcement officials raided the school on Friday, there were still 19 boys in captivity. Their current status is also unclear.

It never should have come to this. In 2021, after some of these Christian boarding schools began making headlines for alleged acts of abuse, the stories were so disturbing that Republicans in Missouri’s legislature considered and passed a bill requiring some oversight of these schools. After so many years of being fully exempt from any statewide regulations, faith-based schools now have to meet basic health and safety guidelines, conduct background checks on employees, provide students with basic necessities like food and health care, and give parents access to their kids at all times.

The bar is still as low as ever. Yet even that wasn’t enough to prevent the alleged abuses at Lighthouse. The arrests of the Musgraves suggests some of those former students may finally find closure after all these years. If they are eventually convicted of 1st Degree Kidnapping, they could face between 10-30 years in prison, which could effectively be life sentences for both of them.

Incidentally, when I was researching this story online, I came across this pinned post on Reddit from a former student. It was posted a month ago, weeks before the arrest, but it was meant to reach people who might be searching for information about the school.

The Redditor said she attended Lighthouse when she was 15; her mother sent her there to protect her from her father. Instead, she wrote, the “physical, emotional, mental and spiritual abuse that I and so many other children experienced was criminal.”

I reached out to her for more comment, but I didn’t hear back in time.

Two quick side notes: The Star noted that the Musgraves and Lighthouse principal Craig W. Smith, Jr. were sued in 2009 for sexual abuse:

It alleged that Smith groomed a female student after she enrolled in 2005, then “committed multiple acts of sexual bodily contact” with her — including intercourse — from September 2007 until June 2008.

The lawsuit says the girl’s parents notified the Musgraves in late 2007 that they were concerned about the degree of Smith’s personal relationship with their daughter, but nothing was done to prevent further contact between them. The lawsuit was settled in 2010, court records show, with a $100,000 judgment entered against Smith and a $750,000 judgment against ABM Ministries and the Musgraves. 

This is yet another example of how religious leaders who cloak themselves in faith-based rhetoric are often a serious threat to children while the people conservatives deem “groomers”—like drag queens, LGBTQ people, and liberal allies—are no such thing at all.

Also, the husband and wife behind the “Circle of Hope Girls’ Ranch and Boarding School,” Boyd and Stephanie Householder, are scheduled to have their trial this fall. They have pleaded not guilty to 102 criminal charges of child abuse.