Parents say Avon, Conn., teachers lured their daughters into a cult

NEW HAVEN, Conn., May 23 (UPI) -- A couple in an affluent suburb of Hartford, Conn., say three Spanish teachers and a guidance counselor at the high school lured their daughters into a cult.

The parents, joined by the youngest of their three daughters, filed a lawsuit Wednesday in federal court in New Haven. They charge the teachers at Avon High School were promoting a group that "celebrates death."

The named defendants include the teachers, the Avon schools and Wellesley College in Wellesley, Mass. The parent say that Wellesley failed to protect the two older daughters, who became students there, from their former teachers.

The Avon schools responded with a statement that no charges of this type have been made in the past.

The parents say they noticed changes in their daughters' behavior. But they said they only discovered what had caused them when the younger daughter "broke free" of her ties to the teachers.

In court papers, the parents said the girls "began speaking a bizarre new language." Their behavior allegedly became girls "flat and distant, reclusive, secretive, and non-communicative."

The teachers allegedly kept in touch with the older daughters after they entered Wellesley.