Via DataLounge:

"...from a woman who worked on the set of Growing Pains. Apparently Leo being young, cute and charming was very good at pumping people for information under the guise of wanting to learn more about the acting biz.

One of the people he routinely got info from was Kirk Cameron who in trying to protect him, warned him about all the pedos in Hollywood. This was about the time Kirk was becoming a Christian so he loved regaling Leo with sordid stories about all the gays and child molesters and telling Leo to stay away from both.

Leo used that info to blackmail certain people into giving him roles that he didn't really deserve. And he continued to do this well into the 90s which explains how he went from Critters 3 to working with De Niro and Depp."

https://www.datalounge.com/thread/18505887