Attorney Says College Head Received Free Research Help : Courts: Pierce President Lowell Erickson, while with Mission College, failed to disclose the alleged gift as required by the state, suit contends.

The attorney for a former Mission College finance department worker charged Tuesday that the then-president of the school, Lowell Erickson, illegally failed to report that a college employee performed work for Erickson for free.

The attorney said that James Austin, vice president of administration, compiled district financial and attendance data in 1988 for Erickson, Mission’s acting president at the time. The attorney, Dale Gronemeier, said Austin received no compensation for his work.

Erickson, now president of Pierce College, intended to use the material gathered by Austin in his doctoral dissertation, Gronemeier alleged. Erickson then failed to disclose Austin’s alleged gift of services on conflict-of-interest forms required by the state.

Gronemeier actually represents Benson Cheng, a former finance department worker at Mission, in a stress disability lawsuit against the Los Angeles Community College District. Gronemeier raised the issue of Austin’s work while discussing Cheng’s lawsuit at a news conference Tuesday.

Erickson, who denied any wrongdoing, said he needed the data to prove to the district that Mission College was underfunded, as well as for the dissertation. “We wanted to compare our college’s figures with those of the other colleges to try to prove to the district that our growth warranted more operating budget,” Erickson said in a letter to Connie L. Michaels, an attorney for the college district.

Erickson refused comment after Gronemeier’s news conference Tuesday, referring reporters’ questions to the district’s attorneys.

Jaffe Dickerson, Michaels’ co-worker, said the district denies Gronemeier’s charges and characterized the allegations concerning Austin as “attempts of a desperate attorney who sees his case slipping away.”

A spokeswoman for the state Fair Political Practices Commission, which monitors reports of gifts from public officials, said she is unsure whether research would constitute a gift. “Someone would have to file a complaint before we would investigate,” said the spokeswoman, Carol Thorpe.

In depositions taken by Gronemeier, both Austin and Erickson testified that they could not remember whether Erickson had solicited the work or whether Austin had volunteered for the task.

Gronemeier said he intends to amend his lawsuit filed on Cheng’s behalf Nov. 16, 1990, to include Erickson as a defendant. Only the college district and Austin are now parties to the suit, the attorney said.

Cheng, 46, of Los Angeles, who left the district’s employment in June, 1989, after more than 10 years, is asking for $420,000 in past and future wages and other penalties, yet to be determined, for pain and suffering and emotional distress.

He claims he was forced to leave the district because of stress caused by Austin’s “abrasive management style.”

Specifically, he said Austin’s alleged harassment caused a serious eye injury to worsen. He said his eyes can focus no longer than five minutes on the computer required by his job.

Erickson did not respond to Cheng’s complaints about Austin because he was grateful for the free work Austin performed for him, the lawsuit asserts.