Drunk-Driver Treatment Center Loses County Contract

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors canceled its contract Tuesday with a Van Nuys drunk-driving treatment program suspected of falsifying completion certificates and of other irregularities.

Without discussion, the board, with Supervisor Kenneth Hahn absent, voted unanimously to end its relationship with the Van Nuys branch of Driver Safety Schools, effective Oct. 12. Meanwhile, the county and other agencies, including police, are investigating operations at the company’s six other branches, which also have county contracts.

County officials have been referring the 800 people enrolled in the Van Nuys school to other court-ordered programs. Officials had stopped new referrals to Driver Safety School’s six other sites until the review is completed.

The company’s other branches are in Canoga Park, Glendale, Beverly Hills, East Los Angeles, Huntington Park and Whittier.

A report to the supervisors by the county Department of Health Services recommended ending the contract but gave no reason for doing so. The director of the county’s Office of Alcohol Programs declined to comment on why the contract was canceled.

However, a July 16 accident involving a former Driver Safety Schools student has sparked an investigation of the school by the county, the Los Angeles Police Department, the state Department of Motor Vehicles and the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs.

Two people were killed in that crash, which occurred three days after the driver, Harry Bouboushian, received a certificate from Driver Safety Schools showing that he had completed a one-year treatment program that he entered after a previous drunk-driving conviction.

Bouboushian, 34, of Los Angeles, was charged with murder and felony drunk driving. A preliminary hearing was set for Oct. 2.

Los Angeles police said the school’s records indicate that Bouboushian was given the certificate before he completed the program. Detective Richard Levos of the department’s bunco forgery division said he is trying to determine whether there were other irregularities at the school.

Barbara Bloomberg, a member of the county’s Commission on Alcoholism, said at least two students told county officials, in letters or sworn statements, that school employees offered to provide certificates as long as the program fees were paid--regardless of whether the students attended the required sessions.

Certificate for $1,000

One student said he was offered a completion certificate for $1,000, she said.

The owner of Driver Safety Schools, Arnold Abrams, could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

His attorney, Morse A. Taylor, declined to comment. However, Taylor previously acknowledged that Bouboushian received his certificate three weeks early but said Bouboushian completed all the necessary work. Taylor said that a school counselor sold a certificate for about $300 to a client who never attended the program, but that Abrams fired the employee when he learned of the incident.

Al Wright, director of the county’s Office of Alcohol Programs, said his office is continuing its investigation into the six other sites operated by Driver Safety Schools. But he declined comment on Tuesday’s action or the reasons behind it.

The Bouboushian incident moved the Board of Supervisors to establish a panel last month to improve supervision of more than 130 similar drunk-driving programs countywide. About 50,000 people attend the privately run programs each year as part of the court-ordered penalty for drunk driving.