Flesh-Eating Bacteria Kills Ventura Educator

What appears to be California’s first death from the so-called flesh-eating bacteria was recorded Sunday here, where the popular chancellor of the Ventura County Community College District died a few days after complaining of a severe sore throat.

Thomas G. Lakin, 50, died Sunday afternoon at Los Robles Regional Medical Center. Ventura County Senior Deputy Coroner Mitch Breese confirmed that the cause of death was necrotizing fasciitis, which has been dubbed flesh-eating bacteria.

The ailment is caused by a virulent, sometimes deadly strain of streptococcus and other germs.

Although friends said Sunday that Lakin had complained of a severe sore throat as early as last Wednesday, he did not seek medical treatment until Friday, they said, when he went to the Los Robles emergency room.

He was treated at the hospital for symptoms of strep throat, but was released hours later, said Jeff Marsee, vice chancellor of the college district.

Lakin was admitted to the medical center when he returned to the emergency room Saturday after a sharp pain began in his leg and his throat failed to improve, Marsee said.

“They were focusing on the pain in the leg area,” said Marsee, who spent most of Saturday night and Sunday at the hospital with Lakin and his family, while doctors tried to stop the bacteria from spreading.

“But this is a very rare bacteria,” Marsee said. “When it goes, it goes like wildfire.”

Lakin, the highest-ranking African American official in Ventura County, whose population is about 2% black, was president of Los Angeles Southwest Community College for five years before taking his Ventura County post in 1991.

Lakin’s is the fifth case of flesh-eating bacteria reported in Ventura County in the past six months.

Physicians who treated the chancellor over the weekend declined to discuss details of the case, citing a family request for privacy. Hospital officials also declined to comment.

But Breese said the diagnosis was made after exhaustive tests at the hospital to see whether the chancellor had any other health problems.

“They did CAT scans, all the tests and it all came up negative,” Breese said.

Despite recent news media attention, the problem is not new or even more widely reported than in the past, medical experts say.

Its name--necrotizing fasciitis--comes from the words necrosis, meaning death of tissue, and fascia , the tissue that binds skin to muscle. The ailment is caused by a dangerous strain of the common germ known as Group A streptococcus. In 1990, the most recent year such fatalities were officially counted, Group A strep accounted for 2,000 to 3,000 deaths in the nation, up to half of those from the necrotizing fasciitis strain.

The condition develops when the body succumbs to a series of bacterial infections and can flare up with either a cut in the skin or a lapse in the immune system.

Although no other fatal cases are known in California, a 51-year-old Denver woman died in July after her legs below the knees, an arm and a breast were amputated because of the bacteria. A 72-year-old San Antonio man and a 33-year-old Michigan man also died in June from the disorder. The disease has claimed at least 11 lives in Britain and cases have recently been reported in New York, Florida, and Connecticut.

All five of the Ventura County cases were treated at Los Robles Regional Medical Center. The hospital says it treats about eight cases of the bacteria every year, including patients from Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo.

Earlier this year, Bernard Donner, a 35-year-old Santa Barbara triathlete, lost most of the flesh on his leg to the bacteria. He was treated at a Sherman Oaks Hospital and released.

Lakin’s death shocked Ventura County college officials.

“I’m floored by this. . . . I’m just shell-shocked,” said Gary Morgan, an instructor at Oxnard College who knew Lakin. “It sounds more like a horror movie than real life.”

Those who worked closest to Lakin said Sunday that he was known throughout the county for his fiscal acumen and passion for higher education.

Lakin was hired by the Ventura County Community College District in 1991, in the midst of a budget crisis that continues to this day.

“He was well-known for his abilities to manage money and districts that were in financial problems and bring them into financial solvency,” said Pete E. Tafoya, one of the governing board members who hired Lakin.

“He was a wonderful boss and leader,” said Barbara Buttner, a district official who worked directly under Lakin.

“One of the special things I think about Thomas was that he had confidence in the people he put into positions of responsibility,” she said. “He gave you an assignment and then left you free to be creative and soar as high as you could.”

Lakin was a product of California schools, having graduated from high school in Los Angeles in 1961. He earned a bachelor’s degree, a master’s and a Ph.D. in education by 1972--all from UCLA.

By 1977, he was becoming a highly recruited administrator, and was hired as dean of instruction at Los Angeles Mission College, while teaching economics courses at Loyola Marymount University and Cal State Dominguez Hills.

Lakin became a vice president at Los Angeles Trade Technical College in 1980, and was named president of Los Angeles Southwest College in 1986. He spent five years in that spot before accepting the chancellor position in Ventura County.

He is survived by his wife, Karen, and two daughters, Ashley, 9, and Evin, 6. He also has two daughters from a previous marriage, Lesa and Lori, both of Los Angeles.

Times staff writer Miguel Bustillo and correspondent Matthew Mosk contributed to this story.