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High-Risk Girl Sent To Strict Facility

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By TODD LESKANIC, The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 8, 2008

DADE CITY - Victoria Rupple's case may be the rare one in which the justice system - not the defendant - receives a second chance to get it right.

The 16-year-old Wesley Chapel girl was tossed into the system in October 2006 when she was arrested and accused of attempting to drown her younger brother in a bathtub.

Rupple pleaded guilty to the charge last year and was sent to what Circuit Judge Pat Siracusa and Rupple's family thought was a safe treatment facility in Pinellas County. Instead, she wound up being moved to a second facility, where she got pregnant and used drugs.

She admitted a probation violation at a hearing last month and returned to court Thursday to learn what the penalty would be. Intent on not seeing a repeat, Siracusa this time sent her to a high-risk juvenile facility in DeSoto County.

Unlike at the Pinellas County facilities, Rupple will be confined as she receives psychological and substance abuse counseling and takes parenting classes. The treatment program takes a year to 18 months to complete.

When she's released, Rupple will be expected to earn a high school diploma, find a job and submit to random drug tests.

The girl's father, Shane Rupple, said the new sentence seemed to better fit his daughter's needs.

"I'm definitely happy with the placement they found for her," he said. "I still want to go visit the place and check it out, but it seems like the place for her."

Victoria Rupple will be held in Pasco's Juvenile Detention Center until a bed opens up in DeSoto County. That is expected to take at least a few weeks.

Last month, Shane Rupple criticized the system for sending his daughter to a place where she would have the freedom to get pregnant and use drugs. Although he signed off on the plea bargain that sent her to Pinellas County, he did so only because he thought his daughter was going somewhere she would get help. Only later did he learn otherwise.

The hangover from that experience continues: Rupple has been unwilling to identify the father of her child. When Siracusa asked her in court Thursday, she told him she didn't know and couldn't remember.

Only when her probation officer produced a purported picture of the man in a letter to her did Rupple finally volunteer his name. No proof was presented that the person in the photo is the child's father.

Shane Rupple has said his daughter's troubles began with her mother's suicide a few years ago. Her grades dropped, and she began seeing a counselor.

Victoria Rupple spent a year living with her aunt in Tampa, then moved back in with her family in Wesley Chapel in the spring of 2006.

She was attending Wesley Chapel High School and seemed to be doing better. She got along well with her 9-year-old brother, Michael.

But on Aug. 12, 2006, her 16-year-old stepbrother returned home and found Michael face down in the tub.

The boy spent a week in St. Joseph's Hospital but has made a full recovery.

Rupple was taken into custody two months later.

The relationship between Shane Rupple and his daughter has been rocky since then. At last month's hearing, she turned and mouthed "I hate you" and "Go away" to him. Shane Rupple said news of his daughter's pregnancy caused the rift.

Things seemed better between father and daughter Thursday.

"I'm sorry," she mouthed to him at the end of the hearing. "I love you."

Shane Rupple fought back tears.

Reporter Todd Leskanic can be reached at (352) 521-3156 or tleskanic@tampatrib.com.

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