Father of teen who died at Utah boarding school says staff ignored her sickness complaints

HURRICANE, Utah — It has been a difficult month and a half for the family of Taylor Goodridge, a teenager who died while at Diamond Ranch Academy. Her father, Dean Goodridge, said he is still processing the loss.

“Taylor was an amazing child. She was always smiling and laughing,” he said. “Losing her didn’t just affect our family, it affected the tribe, it affected the community.”

The 17-year-old was an active member of the Stillaguamish Tribe in her home state of Washington.

“She helped out in the tribal community, our elders program, our education program,” Goodridge said. “She was everywhere throughout the tribe and our community.”

Goodridge said his daughter had run into some issues during her teenage years. Her family was counseled to send her to Diamond Ranch Academy. The facility is a boarding school for at-risk youth in Hurricane, Utah.

“She was supposed to just go there for, you know, her issues, get help,” he said.

Her father would have weekly video calls with her, but in mid-December, Goodridge said the school canceled their call, saying Taylor was too sick to take it.

“I got told the week before in a Zoom meeting with her counselor at Diamond Ranch Academy and a parent coordinator,” he said. “They said she had the stomach bug.”

On Dec. 20, a day before they were set to see each other in person, he got a phone call from the school saying Taylor’s health was declining.

“They made it sound like she fainted, not that they were giving her CPR and she was dying,” Goodridge said. “Then 30 minutes later I get a phone call that she’s gone.”

He is now suing Diamond Ranch Academy in federal court. The lawsuit alleges the school ignored Taylor’s complaints of excruciating abdominal pain and told her to “suck it up.” The family is seeking unspecified damages “sufficient to punish” the facility.

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“They should have taken her to the doctor. They look at it as the kid is trying to pull something or doesn’t want to do this or doesn’t want to do that,” he said. “The way they treat the kids there, it’s not what the brochure shows.”

The family has learned through the investigation that the school ran tests on Taylor earlier in the day.

“They said they ran tests and her sugar levels came back fine. How do they come back fine and literally hours later and my daughter is gone?” Goodridge said.

The cause of Taylor’s death is still under investigation, but Goodridge said investigators believe his daughter died of sepsis.

The school remains open, but the Utah Department of Health and Human Services placed it on conditional status while police investigate the death.

Utah boarding school ignored teen’s sickness complaints before she died, ex-staff say

Goodridge is determined to take it a step further and wants to make sure this does not happen to any other family.

“I want them shut down! I don’t want them to ever be in charge of some person’s child ever again,” he said.

Diamond Ranch Academy has not responded to multiple requests for comment.