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carmencita ago

Wow Sexual Abuse by Staff Member at Casa Pacifica

https://www.propublica.org/article/investigations-of-california-group-homes-marked-by-delays-and-uncertainty

In March of 2009, the Department of Social Services received a complaint that a staff member at a 28-bed group home called Casa Pacifica in Camarillo was having sex with a minor resident.

The home’s chief executive, Steven Elson, had hired the worker in 2008, and Elson said the man passed a background check performed by DSS. Elson said he had submitted the man’s fingerprints and work history information to the department. The department, Elson said, reviewed the material and cleared him to work in the home in early 2008.

Six months later, Elson said he started receiving emails from staff about the worker. The man was supposed to be working exclusively with boys, but he kept showing up in the girls’ cottage. Elson said he reprimanded the man, but decided to keep him on the staff.

In early 2009, a female resident of the home complained about the man’s conduct. She said the man had been having sex with another girl on the campus. Elson’s staff filed an unusual incident report with DSS. Elson said he also began an internal investigation. He couldn’t substantiate the girl’s claim. The alleged victim said she never had sex with the man and the accuser recanted her allegation. Elson said he fired the worker anyway.

But the inspectors did unearth one troubling, incontrovertible fact: It turned out the worker had impregnated an under-age child eight years earlier in 2001, state records show. The child was not a resident of a group home, and the man had yet to begin working for a home. Still, both the department and Elson missed that troubling episode during their background check. WHAT? IMPREGNATED?

No action was taken against the facility.“There are no deficiencies cited,” the report concludes. UH WHAT?

This is the home that Sheriff Dean sits on the Bof D. WOW.