" |
 |
| "Arkansas' Voice on the Internet" | Previous Features / Investigations |
 |
|
Who'll take the fall over youth services? RAY PIERCE ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE State officials are speculating about who has been "set up" to "take the fall" in the controversy over abuse of youths in state custody. The former director of the Department of Human Services, which incorporates the division that oversees youth facilities where abuse has been alleged, is Lee Frazier. He told state police investigators, according to a state police report, that he believed he was "deceived and somewhat set up" by former Youth Services Division Director Ruth Whitney and her then-deputy Lloyd Warford. Frazier resigned July 1 and took a job with the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Whitney told reporters Monday after a legislative hearing on abuse allegations that she may have been set up to take the fall for the alleged abuse during her tenure as division chief. Some allegations of abuse involved matters that occurred after she left the director's post. "There's a possibility of that," she said of being set up. "Obviously, I'm upset about that." Whitney was division director from 1995 until being reassigned as interim director of county operations for the department in March. She said she made the appropriate responses involving reports of abuse and told the appropriate people. "If you look at the information in the Arkansas State Police report, it conclusively documents in my chronology who was notified and when they were notified and what the instructions were and what the limitations were in terms of disclosure," she said. That notification included people within the executive branch. The state police report includes Whitney's chronology of events that she gave to Department of Human Services Chief Counsel Jonann Coniglio. "The above chronology and attached documentation demonstrate that Mr. Frazier was fully briefed on the findings of the investigations I directed at the [Central Arkansas Observation and Assessment Center] and the Division's contracted serious offender programs," she wrote in that document. "These investigations went beyond the regular investigative process of the Department's Special Investigations Unit, which as I recall on less than [five] occasions, made findings of some credible evidence of abuse and neglect." Whitney said she was convinced that the truth would come out. "If given the opportunity, I think the right members of the committee are there, they're asking the right questions, and I'm prepared to answer them," she said. This article was published on Tuesday, July 14, 1998 Copyright, permissions and privacy policy Copyright © 2008, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc. All rights reserved. This document may not be reprinted without the express written permission of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc. |
 |
|