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Autism Vox

Boy Dies Wrapped in Weighted Blanket

by Kristina Chew, PhD on June 20th, 2008

9-year-old Gabriel Poirier died on April 18th after being wrapped by teachers in a weighted blanket. The June 19th Canada.com reports that a coroner has ruled that Gabriel died of suffocation—-news which his parents were shocked by, as the school (in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, south of Montreal) reported that he had died “‘naturally and calmly.’”

In the early afternoon of April 17, Gabriel Poirier began to disturb his classmates with loud noises. His teachers gave him two warnings to calm down. When he continued misbehaving, one of the teachers took him to the corner of the classroom and rolled him into a weighted blanket, which is sometimes used to calm autistic children.

With his arms by his side, the heavy blanket was tightly wrapped around Gabriel’s small body at least four times, the coroner’s report said. With only the “tip of his toes” peaking out, he was left on his stomach, his head covered, for more than 20 minutes.

Gabriel eventually stopped making noise. The teacher went to check on him, turning him onto his back. Gabriel appeared “listless and blue in the face,” the coroner’s report said.

The teacher called 911 and the school nurse performed CPR. The boy was already in a deep coma, however, and died the next day in hospital.

Gilles Poirier noted that Gabriel was small, weighing 53 pounds (24 kilograms); the blanket weighed 40 pounds. At a news conference, he said this of his son: “‘He was a very gentle boy…….Sometimes he was loud, but he was never aggressive or violent. I just don’t understand how this happened.’”

I don’t either—-my son is much bigger than Gabriel and has certainly had more than a few moments of being loud. What helps Charlie is to recognize that he is trying to communicate—-that the noise-making is a sign of something and not just a “behavior” that needs to be stopped—and to focus on teaching him other ways to express himself. And what can one make of the school district saying that Gabriel died “‘naturally and calmly’”?

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28 opinions for Boy Dies Wrapped in Weighted Blanket

  • Bonnie Sayers
    Jun 20, 2008 at 1:02 am

    Another senseless tragedy. I see ads for ebay selling weighted blankets, how odd is that? We have a quiet quilt that my kids like to press their chins into while bouncing on an oblong (peanut shaped) exercise ball. I have it in the closet till colder season as it is so thick to be on the couch this time of year.

  • Regan
    Jun 20, 2008 at 1:37 am

    Mechanical restraint under the guise of “calming”.
    Death for the “egregious” crime of making noise.

    Sometimes I wonder who is supposed to have the cognitive or mental deficit.

  • Kathy
    Jun 20, 2008 at 2:04 am

    I just feel like crying.
    That poor little fella left alone and ignored for 20 minutes.
    Tears are running down my cheeks, and I feel like screaming, “NATURALLY AND CALMLY!!!!!”
    He couldn’t move he, couldn’t breath.. For God’s sake!!!
    What’s wrong with these people?

    My heart goes out to little Gabriel Poirier’s family..

  • bullet
    Jun 20, 2008 at 5:06 am

    That poor lad and his family :(. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with weighted blankets if used properly and the right weight is used. Unfortunately this was a situation where it clearly wasn’t used properly.

  • Regan
    Jun 20, 2008 at 5:21 am

    “…Mr. Menard said the parents were surprised to learn Gabriel had been placed in the blanket as a punishment. The school board had initially said it was a natural death and that Gabriel had gone under the blanket on his own…”

    http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=599813

  • Harold L Doherty
    Jun 20, 2008 at 6:01 am

    ” What helps Charlie is to recognize that he is trying to communicate—-that the noise-making is a sign of something and not just a “behavior” that needs to be stopped—and to focus on teaching him other ways to express himself.”

    Obviously.

    That is one of the reasons that ABA is used, to reduce problematic behavior AND to enhance communication skills.

    This is a very serious case that should not be reduced to the usual story lines that dominate autism internet “debates”.

    The Montreal Gazette reports that the boy “was rolled in a weighted blanket. With his arms by his side, he was left on his stomach for over 20 minutes with only his toes exposed.”

    If the above information is correct I would think that the authorities would have at least examined the possibility of charges of criminal negligence causing death.

    It certainly seems foreseeable that a child whose arms are restrained, who is placed face down, and whose face is covered, would have trouble breathing. To leave a child in that situation, unattended for 20 minutes, is incomprehensible. I can think of no excuse or justification for those actions.

  • Kristina Chew, PhD
    Jun 20, 2008 at 6:36 am

    Sadly, not so obvious, it seems.

  • Regan
    Jun 20, 2008 at 6:40 am

    This is a very serious case that should not be reduced to the usual story lines that dominate autism internet “debates”.
    —————————
    Who’s debating?
    Harold, I absolutely agree with you, and have been very troubled about why no criminal charges have been filed.

  • Kristina Chew, PhD
    Jun 20, 2008 at 8:46 am

    Am also troubled by the passage Regan cited, about the use of the blanket as a “punishment”—–my understanding of the use of such blankets has been as a calming device.

  • farmwifetwo
    Jun 20, 2008 at 9:03 am

    “to reduce problematic behavior AND to enhance communication skills”

    Since when is vocal noise problematic???

    My severe non-verbal PDD 6.5yr old (who is in a REGULAR gr 1 class, and will be in a REGULAR gr 2 class next year) has been taught to sit on the carpet on his sensory pillow (which the school board purchased per his OT’s request), the teacher has a “shhh” PEC, a “legs crossed” PEC and a “Hand up/shhh” PEC. Which ALL the children have learned to respond to. Not just little boy. The children… just ignore the vocal noise. I sent a “having a friend with autism” (B&N) picture book which is now in the school library at the beginning of the year to his class. The children and teacher have no issues with his “quirks”.

    If he was having sensory issues, thereby increasing vocal noise… as little boy has had this past month.. then a sensory diet, considerations need to have been put in place.

    The noise is not “bad”… it needs to be recognized for what it is… happy/sad/sensory overload etc… that is how you treat behaviour… you teach to it, you don’t call it “bad”.

    Trust me.. if they EVER tried that with my Son… which is also one of the reason’s I don’t trust the segregated classes… especially after meeting one of the EA’s at gym.

    S.

  • farmwifetwo
    Jun 20, 2008 at 9:37 am

    Psst.. Harold.. your precious ABA therapist have destroyed my son’s left hand. Short of major hand surgery there is no way to straighten the fingers he has twisted so badly. And no way to get it stopped. Sensory interventions have lessened the wringing, but he still does it under stress.

    Why?? B/c ABA thought he should sit for a minimum of 3hrs at a time doing unending rote learning. No breaks.. he’s autistic according to them… therefore not a CHILD. Children require breaks at regular intervals.

    So.. what did he do.. he started using his right hand to twist his left fingers, leaving blisters.

    All they had to do was recognize that he was a CHILD and needed proper breaks… if I could prove it.. I’d sue.

    S.

  • Chuck
    Jun 20, 2008 at 9:41 am

    Psst farmwifetwo,

    If you can’t prove it then why are you telling us about it?

  • farmwifetwo
    Jun 20, 2008 at 10:17 am

    B/c Chuck just like the never ending nightmares/terrors/diahhrea… “Some autistic children are like that”.

    Per the specialists. But I was there… I watched him fall apart… I watched him finally assault (5 actions against others in one session) his male therapist - which was the last time he was in my house. He’s NEVER had any behavioural issues - biting, hitting, pinching - before or after them.

    I’m the one that got them out, I’m the one that had the Director of the program at my meeting to get them out.

    I’m not stupid, actually I have more post-secondary education then they had - and probably more therapy experience after teaching 2 children and working with my SLP’s and OT’s over the years.

    Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the cause, when it never occured before, yet the child was in pt time daycares, daycamps etc.

    The attitude is… Therapy is never wrong.. and in this province.. fed by Autism Ontario itself… ABA is the be all and end all… and it never the Therapists fault, it’s the childs.

    S.

  • Kristina Chew, PhD
    Jun 20, 2008 at 10:23 am

    ABA, sensory integration, discrete trials—-they can all be effective means of teaching. Looking at things from a behavioral perspective and thinking in terms of ABC data (=antecedent-behavior-consequence) and on some occasions having an FBA conducted (functional behavior assessment)—-these methods have been useful in addressing difficulties in learning, communicating, and more for my son.

    However, I’ve also witnessed the results of misinformed implementation of many therapies, including ABA and sensory integration. One ABA consultant here in New Jersey created a plan to lessen my son’s head-banging that actually increased it; one occupational therapist decided that Charlie’s sensory needs called for the use of the color orange, Native American pipes and drum music, and orange scent—-these did not help.

    Now my son’s teachers and therapists, and Jim and I too, look at what we are doing when my son has trouble learning something. It’s not simply that he’s not or can’t get “it,” but that we need to change the way we teach.

  • Emily
    Jun 20, 2008 at 10:41 am

    Any method of teaching or therapy or parenting or discipline can be abused, carried to far, misapplied, inappropriately used. Any method of teaching or therapy or parenting or discipline should be applied individually, always with modifications to the person involved. So…ABA, OT, weighted blankets, whatever…use what’s good, toss what’s not.

    This story is horrific. That child was murdered in his classroom, and these people–including the cover-your-ass school district–should be held accountable. How does any child die “naturally and calmly” without warning in a classroom? That poor poor little boy, suffocating his life away under a near-his-body-weight blanket on a floor just because he made “too much” noise. There is really no punishment severe enough for the people who did this or for those who tried to cover it up. Horrible.

  • mayfly
    Jun 20, 2008 at 3:30 pm

    A device, brought into the classroom to calm a child, ends up killing that child.

    I’m not sure the teacher was trying to punish Gabriel, but wanted to calm him.

    What I don’t understand is the abandonment of common sense resulting in the neglect of Gabriel that resulted in his death.

    Perhaps the teacher had been told, to wrap him more tightly so he will become calmer. Of course any struggles by Gabriel to free himself just led to a tighter wrapping.

    But there is more than that here. Why cover the head at all? Was that part of the calming protocol? Why was there no one monitoring him? Why did they bother to check him in 20 minutes? If he was already blue and listless, had he lost control of his bowels?

    I think this goes beyond the classroom.

    My daughter won’t keep the lightest of sheets on her at night. They don’t appear to cause her pain, she prefers to sleep with no covers. I’m the same way

    ABA, it is the most successful teaching method for autistic children, though not nearly as successful as some of its advocates. So much depends on the therapists themselves, and even with the best therapists it benefits are so often less than advertised. Yet I repeat my first statement: ABA, it is the most successful teaching method for autistic children.

  • Regan
    Jun 20, 2008 at 3:56 pm

    farmwifetwo said,
    “ABA is the be all and end all… and it never the Therapists fault, it’s the childs.”
    ——————————-
    Interesting. That is a misuse then, since the ABA paradigm that I was taught and practice is that “the child is always right”, and to assume that fault lies with me or how I am teaching; the use of the analysis is to keep me honest. Just from the description, it is clearly a problem with that therapist’s application and lack of attention to your child. Even as someone who has found value in the application of ABA, I would have made the same call and kicked that program out.
    ——————————
    Mayfly said,
    “But there is more than that here. Why cover the head at all? Was that part of the calming protocol? Why was there no one monitoring him? Why did they bother to check him in 20 minutes?:
    ———————————-
    From the newsstory,
    “…Ms. Rudel-Tessier (Coroner) said proper use of the blanket called for a child to be rolled at most once and for his head to be left uncovered. The blanket was to be used as a relaxation therapy, not as a punishment, and teachers were supposed to keep an eye on children using the blankets.

    “A child rolled ‘at least four times’ in such a heavy blanket is under restraint,” the coroner wrote.
    …
    The coroner said use of the blankets should be ceased until clear guidelines are established. Basic rules would include ensuring the blanket is not too heavy for the child, never covering the child’s head, ensuring that vital signs can always be observed, never rolling the child in the blanket and ensuring the child can get out if he wants to…”

    A part of this that I am at least as disturbed and disgusted by is that in addition to the negligence, the board initially lied to these parents that their son had somehow caused his own death by “hiding” under the blanket.

  • Kathi Magee
    Jun 20, 2008 at 5:29 pm

    If a public stoning were legal, I would say line up the school board, administrators and any staff member that played a role in this inoccent little boy’s death and aim well!

    This story cut to the core of many problems our children face. Untrained, undertrained staff using therapies as punishment. This is how Cherry Hill NJ took the concept of a safe zone/ quiet room and turned it into a padded punishment closet.

    When will they realize that they cannot discipline autism out of children? When will they become part of the solution of “teaching” our children skills instead of torturing them?

  • Jennifer
    Jun 20, 2008 at 7:19 pm

    A 40 pound blanket?? Good grief. The one we have in my classroom (9 - 12 year olds) is 10 pounds, and I was told that it was too heavy for some of my smaller students.

    Wow.

    Makes you wonder who initially provided the blanket (and the protocol for it) to the teacher.

  • Marcie
    Jun 20, 2008 at 7:26 pm

    The usual formula for how heavy a blanket should be is 10% of body weight plus one pound. Being an adult who just can’t seem to get enough propriceptive input, I sleep with a 15 lb weighted blanket (the heaviest I could find), a bedspread, and a quilt. I cannot imagine using something this is almost my full body weight, and I don’t understand how that was even aloud to be in classroom.

  • Kristina Chew, PhD
    Jun 20, 2008 at 9:14 pm

    It’s the seeming cover-up from the school that particularly troubles me—-not that the whole story doesn’t, too.

  • Club 166
    Jun 21, 2008 at 12:30 am

    I’m with Kathi Magee. One of our local schools has also used both weighted blankets as well as padded rooms as punishment, instead of as pre-emptive self calming interventions that the students desired.

    I blogged about the blanket thing over a year ago here.

    The more things change, the more they stay the same.

    Joe

  • Cliff
    Jun 21, 2008 at 2:20 am

    “When will they realize that they cannot discipline autism out of children?”

    I don’t know. I even hear my dad using this rhetoric, and I’m seventeen and college!

    Another individual I know had his son just diagnosed with Asperger’s. He’s apparently been trying to “talk” his kid out of it, and even has kind of been harsh on his wife about it (go figure). I mean, I know the guy well-enough to be smart, but there seems to be a reaction to try and treat it as a phase and dismiss it as some easy bad parenting. A lot to work on, all be told.

    Cliff

  • Cliff
    Jun 21, 2008 at 2:22 am

    Wow, correction time (I’m getting sloppy recently!).

    “I don’t know. I even hear my dad using the rhetoric of discipline in regards to my daily issues (particularly sensory issues), and I’m seventeen and in college!”

    There, better!

    Cliff

  • Morgan
    Jun 22, 2008 at 1:04 am

    Google “restraint asphyxia.” Look at the number of times apparently “well-meaning” service providers have inadvertently killed people in their care. Isn’t it time that training on restraint asphyxia became a standard protocol for all special ed and support service workers and first responders?
    Kristina, you’ve blogged on several other similar cases. This is happening all to frequently — and especially in our community.

  • Kristina Chew, PhD
    Jun 22, 2008 at 1:38 am

    And I can see it happening to a child like my son.

    I am sure ASAN is aware of this and will bring it to their attention.

  • Regan
    Jun 22, 2008 at 1:45 am

    Ditto CAICA
    http://www.caica.org/

  • Last Week’s Top Posts
    Jun 22, 2008 at 6:21 pm

    […] Boy Dies Wrapped in Weighted Blanket 9-year-old Gabriel Poirier died on April 18th after being wrapped by teachers in a 40-pound weighted blanket. […]

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