Beleaguered Gay Agency Fights Back

In the weeks since the state filed a broad-ranging set of allegations against a pioneering gay youth agency, its leaders have waged a fierce counterattack, portraying the organization as the victim of an anti-gay government witch hunt driven by rumor and falsehood.

Supporters of Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Social Services Inc. have defended the agency as a unique, scrupulously run provider of services to a population that would otherwise be ignored: troubled and neglected youths who are homosexual or who have the AIDS virus.

State investigative reports paint a far darker picture.

Contained in thousands of pages of state licensing files reviewed by The Times, the documents include detailed accounts of alleged sexual encounters between teenage boys living in GLASS group homes and men associated with the agency.

The documents quote staffers who say they observed a top GLASS official play favorites with certain youths and touch them inappropriately. The papers quote a foster parent who says he was berated by another agency official for raising concerns about possible improprieties.

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The GLASS staff’s own reports of unusual incidents indicate that youngsters had sex with one another in the homes, frequently ran away and occasionally attempted suicide.

The state investigation was opened in the fall of 1994 when a former donor complained of what he perceived to be unethical behavior at GLASS. During the inquiry, other complaints arose.

This March, the California Department of Social Services filed an accusation--since amended to add new allegations--that seeks to revoke GLASS’ license to operate its group homes. Five facilities in Los Angeles with a total of 36 beds serving youngsters placed by various counties, as well as three foster family agencies serving about 140 children, would be affected. The revocation essentially would shut the agency down.

It will be up to an administrative law judge to decide the case at a hearing scheduled to begin Monday.

GLASS representatives have attacked the character of the accusers, saying that a number of the purported victims deny anything improper happened and insisting that most of the allegations were previously investigated by authorities and found to be unsubstantiated.

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A review of the state files--which The Times obtained through a California Public Records Act request--confirms that GLASS had reported a number of the sexual allegations to the county or state. In some cases, however, it appears authorities never fully investigated those reports. And no state documents could be found pronouncing the allegations unfounded.

The files contain summaries of interviews or statements from eight youths who told state licensing investigators that eight men associated with GLASS engaged in some form of sexual conduct with them, ranging from propositioning and fondling the youths to intercourse. The alleged incidents span a five-year period beginning in 1991.

Another three teenagers told investigators they were not victims of alleged sexual improprieties. Despite the denials, in some of those instances the state maintains that there are enough witness accounts to justify a misconduct accusation. The state also says GLASS should have reported the suspected abuse of the three teenagers to child protection agencies, but did not.

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One of the more extensive accounts was given in March by a youth who had run away from GLASS and been arrested on suspicion of auto theft in Riverside. His name was blacked out from the files, as were the names of other alleged victims and witnesses.

Interviewed at San Bernardino Juvenile Hall 11 days before the initial state accusation was filed, the teenager said he had consensual sex three or four times with Bernard La Fianza Jr., GLASS’ finance director and a former board member.

Some of the acts occurred in a group home, he said, and some in a vehicle in the parking lot of the Westside’s Beverly Center, where the youth said he went with La Fianza on shopping trips. He further contended that La Fianza used GLASS funds to buy him clothes and restaurant meals.

The teenager also says that beginning last summer, he routinely had sex with Henderson Slaughter, a part-time night supervisor at one of the group homes, who he said gave him money and gifts. The teen described the sexual encounters--more than 19--as consensual, but said that on one occasion when he asked Slaughter to stop, Slaughter threatened to beat him.

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Slaughter and La Fianza--both now barred by the state from involvement with GLASS--have denied the charges.

Moreover, in documents and an interview, La Fianza’s attorney, his brother Richard, has called the teen a former prostitute who is “almost a pathological liar,” is “extremely manipulative and vengeful” and in the past has threatened to allege abuse on the part of GLASS staff.

Indeed, a probation officer told investigators that the youth “has made many false statements”--including a claim that he had AIDS--but had not changed his story about having sex with GLASS staff.

Social Services Department lawyer Lisa Hightower said she interviewed the teenager and had “no doubt” he was telling the truth.

The state files contain a number of other accounts of sexual incidents. Among them:

* Interviewed in 1995, a youth said that a volunteer took him to a movie alone and that on the drive home, they parked the car and engaged in sexual activity. The volunteer, also accused of another sexual incident, denied the charge but was terminated. A state licensing report concluded last year that “lack of supervision” allowed the volunteer to sexually exploit a GLASS resident.

* A youth said he willingly had sex with a part-time staffer one night last year in an office of one of the group homes. Afterward, he said, the two watched the TV program “Married With Children.” The teenager disclosed the alleged incident in March, and it was reported to the state. The staff member denied any misconduct.

Three former and current GLASS staffers say they saw La Fianza play favorites with residents and engage in inappropriate behavior, such as letting teenagers sit on his lap and kissing one on the neck.

Some of those youths have denied improper contact, and Richard La Fianza said the former staffers had in the past been disciplined by his brother.

Allegations previously reported by GLASS were included in the Social Services Department’s accusation, said Hightower, because facilities are responsible for what occurs in them.

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“There have been in my experience more than the average number of sexual molestation complaints” at GLASS, Hightower said. “If you start having a string of events, even when you report it, there’s an indication of a problem.”

Similarly, the state says a lack of supervision is reflected in the volume of reports GLASS filed about residents running away and residents having sex with one another.

Although the group home population is by its nature a difficult one, Hightower contends that GLASS receives enough government funding per child--$4,423 a month--to have the expertise to handle the residents.

Attorney Linda Kollar, who represents GLASS, countered that neither the number of sexual allegations nor the volume of runaway reports indicated management problems.

“I don’t believe when GLASS is taking care of over 3,000 kids in 12 years and many of them are highly sexualized and some . . . are sex offenders . . . that by any stretch of the imagination we could deem the allegations against eight [adults] to be a pattern,” she said.

In accounts related to allegations of double billing, two former staffers say that Teresa DeCrescenzo, the agency’s founder and executive director, instructed them to wait two or three weeks before informing county social workers that a resident had run away--during which time GLASS would continue to be paid for the child but would bring in another resident to fill the vacancy. The state has barred DeCrescenzo from working at GLASS.

“That’s preposterous,” Kollar responded to the accusation. “I have yet to find anyone else who would corroborate that.”