Paris Hilton is sharing photos of herself that were taken immediately after she allegedly suffered abuse at a boarding school in Utah.
Hilton, 39, first opened up about the alleged abuse in the 2020 documentary "This Is Paris." The former "Simple Life" star said her parents, Kathy and Rick Hilton, sent her to a series of "emotional growth schools" when she was a rebellious teen. After running away from the first two schools, Hilton was sent to Utah’s Provo Canyon School, which she described as "the worst of the worst."
In the throwback photos she shared to Instagram on Thursday, Hilton is seen posing in a hat and T-shirt with NYPD logos. Her face in one image looks noticeably weary.
"These photos were taken when I was 18 and had recently came home from the horrible experiences I went through at #ProvoCanyonSchool. I can see the pain in my eyes. I was so traumatized that I pretended everything was okay, trying to block out the painful memories," Hilton wrote in the caption.
"Looking at this now, I know that the teen me would be so incredibly proud of the woman I am today," she continued. "Being brave and using my voice to make a difference and save children from having to endure the abuse myself and so many others have had to go through. #iSeeYouSurvivor #BreakingCodeSilence 🙌"
In "This is Paris," which was directed by Emmy winner Alexandra Dean, Hilton described the abuse she allegedly suffered at the school as verbal, emotional and physical.
"You’re sitting on a chair staring at a wall all day long, getting yelled at or hit," she recalled in the film. "I felt like a lot of the people who worked there got off on torturing children and seeing them naked. They would prescribe everyone all these pills. I didn’t know what they were giving me."
'I would just feel so tired and numb. Some people in that place were just gone, like the lights are on, no one’s home. A lot of people were on suicide watch, and I was so scared that was going to happen to me," she added.
The school's staff allegedly forced Hilton into solitary confinement when they discovered she wasn't taking the pills they'd given her.
"I got into so much trouble for that. Solitary confinement, like something out of 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.' They’d make people take their clothes off and go in there for 20 hours. It felt like I was going crazy," she recalled. "Someone was in the other room that was in a straitjacket screaming. I was just freezing, I was starving. I was alone, and I was scared."
Several of Hilton's former Provo Canyon School classmates appeared in the film to corroborate her story and share their own tales of abuse.
Following the documentary's release last September, Hilton organized a protest in a park near Provo Canyon School, along with hundreds of others who said they were also abused at the school or at similar schools for troubled youth. Hilton has called for the school to be closed.
In September, a representative for Provo Canyon responded to Hilton's allegations in a statement to TODAY: "Originally opened in 1971, Provo Canyon School was sold by its previous ownership in August 2000. We therefore cannot comment on the operations or patient experience prior to this time."
The statement added, in part: "Provo Canyon School today is an intensive, psychiatric residential treatment center for youth between the ages of 8 and 18 that have special, and often complex, mental health and emotional needs. We offer innovative, evidence-based therapeutic interventions, academic instruction and life-skills training tailored to the needs of each of our students."