Molester Jailed in Fondling Case at O.C. Fair

COSTA MESA — A 41-year-old carnival worker and convicted child molester was arrested at the Orange County Fair after he allegedly fondled three girls as they walked through the haunted house attraction, authorities said Friday.

Richard Allen Lee, who told authorities he is a transient, was arrested the evening of July 16 after the three girlfriends from Santa Ana and Riverside, aged 12 to 14, ran from Cactus Jack’s Haunted Shack screaming that someone had rubbed his hands over their bodies.

A supervisor with B & B Amusements, which operates the haunted house, grabbed Lee as he emerged from the exit and held him until sheriff’s deputies arrested him, authorities said. None of the girls, who visited the fair with their mothers, needed medical care, authorities said.

Orange County Fair officials said they do not screen the people who work the fairground’s booths or rides. The hiring is done by the contractor providing the game or ride, said Jill Lloyd, the fair’s spokeswoman.

“We’re open to any suggestions of any changes that law enforcement might recommend,” said fair general manager Norb Bartosik. “Even people who have these types of records have their rights” to privacy.

“Where does the ultimate responsibility lie?” he said. “Does it lie with community, or law enforcement or is it a combined effort? It’s tough to know when someone is going to pull something like this. . . . I don’t think the fair can be blamed for something like this.”

Bartosik said the alleged molestation “is one of those isolated incidents, and whenever you get this many people together it becomes almost like an instant city, and we have all types of issues that people have to deal with.”

Lee worked for PLB Concessions of San Fernando, which runs several game booths at the fair, officials said. PLB Concessions officials could not be reached for comment.

“PLB is one of those independent operators and they provide games at B & B shows,” Lloyd said. “They are responsible for hiring employees. . . . They are not our employees, they are (the responsibility of) whoever is the operator or business operator.”

Lee was assigned to work at one of the game booths near the haunted house but spent time milling around the Haunted Shack attraction, Olson said. When young girls appeared scared to go through the attraction--with tombstones and plastic skeletons splattered with red paint lining the entrance--he would offer to take them through, investigators said. He did not pose as a worker nor wear any type of costume, a fair spokeswoman said.

Lee was charged with nine counts of felony child molestation, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Nancy du Pont. His arraignment at Harbor Municipal Court in Newport Beach was continued until July 30. He was being held in Orange County Jail in Santa Ana in lieu of $50,000 bail, said Sheriff’s Lt. Dick Olson.

The Haunted Shack, which caters mainly to children, was open for business Friday. People roam through a series of narrow walkways inside the attraction, which is full of sharp turns, howling sounds and flashing lights. Much of the amusement is experienced in near total darkness, so people must feel their way around the maze-like structure to get through.

“I can’t believe something like this would happen here at a fair,” said Martha Listner of Oceanside as she walked out of the shack with her children. “This is supposed to be a safe, family sort of place. It makes you wonder if there are any nice places left to take the kids to.”

Added Michael Lee, 18, of Long Beach, who watched as his younger sisters went through the Haunted Shack: “It shows you must be careful, even at a place like this. That’s sad, but it’s the fact.”

Because of Lee’s prior misdemeanor and felony convictions for child molestation, investigators said, they suspect that he might have molested other girls at the fair.

Lee was convicted of felony child molestation in November, 1973, in Carson City, Nevada, according to records in Harbor Municipal Court in Newport Beach. He also has a misdemeanor child molestation conviction, from March, 1979, in Hanford, Calif., a small Central Valley city, according to court records and authorities.

“He fits the profile of a pedophile--a person who only gets pleasure from sexual acts with children,” said Sgt. Dave Remender, who oversees the Sheriff’s Department’s sex crimes division.

Lee did not register as a sex offender in Orange County, although he is required to under state law, law enforcement authorities said.

Lee also has been charged with other alleged offenses in Nevada, court records show. According to the district attorney’s office in Carson City, he was charged in 1977 with misdemeanor trespassing; in 1978 with petty larceny; and in 1980 with embezzlement, which was dismissed the following year.

Law enforcement officials said they waited until Friday, two days before the close of the fair, to announce the arrest because they were following up on information that might help them locate other possible victims.

“Now is the time to put this out because we couldn’t locate any other victims,” Olson said. He said deputies are continuing to investigate.

The arrest last week was the second major incident at the fair this year. On July 12, eight people were injured in a chain-reaction collision on a roller coaster after the ride’s operator, hired by B & B Amusements, apparently failed to activate its brakes.

“It’s always unfortunate that something like this happens when its attached to the fair,” said Lloyd. “The fair comes and goes and people do remember that, and it’s unfortunate, absolutely.

“I think the whole situation, everything that happened at the fair is fully evaluated, and I think, yes, steps will be taken to implement preventive measures as best as we can” to try to guard against further problems with fair workers. But she and fair management said they did not not know what type of changes might be made in the hiring and screening process.

B & B Amusements president Buddy Merten said the child molestation arrest was unfortunate, but “what you do is you hire people and try to interview people. . . . There are thousands of child molesters on the streets.”

Both the Orange County Fair, which hires hundreds of part-time workers each year, and B & B Amusements said they rely on respondents to answer truthfully when asked on forms if they have been convicted of a felony. Otherwise they said they have no legal way of finding out about a person’s criminal record.

Times staff writers David Avila and correspondent Bob Elston contributed to this report.