School Faces Questions on Handling of Sex Charges : Education: Teacher’s aide in Compton district admits having sex with girl, 14, who was pregnant when she accused him of molestation. Earlier charges by three other girls were not reported to police.

When a popular teacher’s aide was accused in 1992 by three young girls at a Compton middle school of molesting them, school officials did not report the allegations to police as required by law, according to the district attorney’s office.

In fact, school officials called the girls liars, the teacher’s aide denounced the girls publicly and other students kicked and taunted two of the girls for complaining about the aide, said an attorney who has filed a lawsuit on behalf of the three alleged victims.

The aide, Twone Torri Flowers, was well liked at Enterprise Middle School, said administrators and students. He was a busy community activist and a talented musician whose work had won public commendation from the school board.

Then in January, a 14-year-old girl made similar allegations. And she was pregnant.

Like the three other students, police said she told authorities that Flowers had written her hall passes to get out of class. She added that Flowers had sex with her a number of times during school in the media room, prosecutors said.

Police and prosecutors said that when questioned, Flowers, 24, admitted having sex with the girl, and last month he pleaded no contest to one count of committing a lewd and lascivious act with a child under the age of 14. When he is sentenced today in Compton Superior Court, Flowers could receive a six-year prison sentence under a plea bargain.

But the matter is far from concluded.

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The school district’s handling of the situation has raised questions about why officials did not notify police after the first three students accused Flowers of molesting them and why a teacher’s aide had so much authority and so little oversight.

Neither Flowers, who has been in jail since his January arrest, nor his attorney would comment on the allegations.

School officials have refused to comment, other than to say that they are investigating what happened and do not condone, encourage or defend any improper conduct by employees. The Compton Unified School District makes every effort to protect students, the officials said.

The official duties of Flowers, a teacher’s aide since 1989, were to tutor students and supervise the playground at Enterprise, according to the district. But Flowers also was given other tasks, including directing the chorus, because he worked well with students and was a skilled musician with a flair for gospel music who could play the piano and organ, said administrators and students.

Last July, Compton Mayor Omar Bradley appointed Flowers to the city Parks and Recreation Commission, a post Flowers still holds, according to the city clerk’s office. In November, Flowers ran unsuccessfully for the school board, finishing 16th in a field of 20 with 2.3% of the vote.

The parents of the first three accusers, who made their allegations in November, 1992, recently filed a civil suit against Flowers and Compton Unified. They are seeking unspecified damages for alleged assault and battery, harassment and negligence, said Leon Jenkins, their attorney.

After being notified by the parents, the district attorney’s office investigated the first allegations. They filed no charges against Flowers because of inconsistencies in the girls’ accounts and a lack of corroborating evidence, said Los Angeles County Deputy Dist. Atty. Sindee Kain-Kerker. Prosecutors filed charges in the later case, Kain-Kerker said, because the girl was pregnant and Flowers admitted having sex with her.

Charges could have been filed against school officials for not reporting the initial allegations. Failure to report allegations of molestation to police is a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail and a fine of $1,000.

“The principal was required by law to report the allegation to police when it came to her attention that there was a complaint of misconduct,” Kain-Kerker said. “But she decided to handle it internally.”

School officials were not prosecuted because it would have been difficult to prove that they should have been suspicious of Flowers, Kain-Kerker said.

The pregnant girl, whose name is being withheld because of her age, has given birth to a girl. Police said Flowers pressured her into a relationship that spanned a two-year period, starting when the girl was a 12-year-old sixth-grader. The family complained about Flowers directly to the police, rather than first going to the school.

“What’s outrageous about this incident is that it happened during the school day, in the middle of the school,” Kain-Kerker said. “And it’s not that it happened just one time, either. It’s outrageous that this would happen, and it’s outrageous that no one would know about it.”

The teacher’s aide retaliated by verbally harassing the girls, according to the lawsuit. Flowers dropped one of his accusers from the chorus, students said.

During the police investigation of the first allegations, Flowers was briefly transferred to a central office desk job, but only after the parents complained that he was continuing to harass their daughters, said district sources who asked not to be named. When no charges were filed in the first case, Flowers returned to Enterprise, district sources said.

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District records do not contain detailed information about whether Flowers was transferred or exactly what his work duties were, school officials said. The officials said the district did not rehire Flowers for the start of the current school year, but sources inside the district said Flowers worked at another middle school as late as mid-December.

Flowers told police that at Enterprise he ran the media department and directed the chorus, an account corroborated by several students and a teacher, who asked not to be named.

The students and the teacher added that Flowers sometimes taught the chorus class, a credit course that met during school hours. Flowers, as a teacher’s aide, could not legally have been allowed to teach a class.

“Flowers was given authority that exceeded anything that a teacher’s aide should have had,” said a district administrator who asked not to be named. “He was covering teachers’ classes by himself and meting out discipline. Students probably thought this guy was a teacher.”

District officials said Flowers was not functioning as a teacher, and in fact, the reports cards for chorus students are signed by a credentialed teacher.

There is no dispute that the chorus has performed under the direction of Flowers, and sang on occasion before Compton city officials as well as the school board. His work drew warm praise from board members, who publicly encouraged him to get a teaching credential.

When the girls and their parents first complained about Flowers, Principal LaVonne Johnson reportedly said she would look into the allegations. According to police records, Johnson never notified law enforcement authorities, the prosecutor said.

Johnson, who was promoted last year to assistant superintendent, could not be reached for comment.

The girls’ parents, dissatisfied with the school’s response, contacted police. Flowers had persistently pursued one of the girls and had fondled two girls, according to the lawsuit. One of the girls, an eighth-grader, told police Flowers loaned her money, sent her love letters and wrote her hall passes to get out of class. She also told police that the two had kissed, and had spoken many times on the phone after school. The girl’s father intercepted one of the calls, the parents said.

The girls who complained about Flowers received repeated threats from students, the lawsuit says. Jenkins said the threats prompted the girls to apply for a transfer to another school. One of the girls was denied a transfer, according to school district paperwork supplied by Jenkins. A brief notation reads: “No knowledge of threats/no formal conference regarding the matter.” The form is signed by then-Principal Johnson and another administrator, who is no longer with the district. Several weeks later, officials reconsidered and eventually granted all the transfers, Jenkins alleges.

Flowers was popular with many students and would allegedly write hall passes to get some of his favorites out of class, students said. Flowers would often send for the girl who became pregnant, Kain-Kerker said. Ostensibly, the girl was helping Flowers with choir duties or other school-related tasks, she said. But this was also the pretext Flowers used for arranging sexual liaisons, the deputy district attorney said.

One teacher told police that the girl, who has a learning disability, was falling behind in her schoolwork because she was taken out of class so often. Earlier, the teacher had called the girl’s mother to say that the girl’s schoolwork was suffering because she was spending too much time on extracurricular activities. But the teacher never mentioned that the girl was being pulled out of class, the girl’s mother said.

In January, a doctor’s exam confirmed that the girl was seven months pregnant, and the girl named Flowers as the father, police said. Flowers neither confirmed nor denied that he was the baby’s father, Kain-Kerker said. He told police that the relationship was consensual, she said, but under the law, sex with an underage girl is considered statutory rape.

The girl’s mother, while upset at Flowers, said she is at least as angry with the school administration and other teachers. “If someone sends for a student that many times, there should be an inquiry,” she said. “No one should have access to a student at any time. It was too easy to get my daughter out of her class. If the school had any suspicions, it should have done a thorough investigation.”

Community correspondent Kimberly Braasch contributed to this story.