Local YMCA Hiring Practices

It’s a place many parents feel is a safe place to send their children, the local YMCA So when a local coach and YMCA employee was recently arrested for child rape and a slew of other charges, many were left asking, how could this happen?

James Conner, 51, was arrested North Reading home on Feb. 12, 2009. The father of two children was charged with repeatedly raping a girl under the age of 14. Since then, another young victim has come forward. Conner now faces a 20-count indictment, and police are trying to determine if there anymore victims.

“Our hearts and sympathies go out to the victims and their families,” says Richard Whitworth, the longtime president and C.E.O. of the Melrose YMCA, where Conner worked up until his arrest.

Hired in 1996, Conner coached girls basketball and helped run a YMCA after-school program at the Beebe elementary school.

Investigators say some of the abuse occurred at the school, where Conner is also accused of setting up hidden cameras to videotape the young girls while they changed.

Whitworth was asked if he or his staff dropped the ball in this situation.

“That's really something, at this point, I can't ask because of ongoing legal matters.”

Whitworth declined to say on camera what he and his staff may or may not have known about Conner prior to his arrest. But according to the state agency that oversees the Melrose YMCA, there was one red flag after another.

A report issued by the Department of Early Education and Care blasts the administration for ignoring repeated warnings about Conner, including important information from the last two places he had been fired from: the YMCA in Reading and the YMCA in Andover.

“I don't know how anybody can read that report, and not say or find that there was something going wrong,” Melrose attorney and child advocate Patricia Wright says.

She calls the findings disgusting.

The report cites numerous incidents where Conner was accused of inappropriate behavior in Reading, Andover and Melrose. The allegations include drinking and smoking marijuana with teenage camp counselors, sleeping next to a young girl at an overnight YMCA event, riding in the back of a school bus with a young girl on his lap, photographing children with his own camera, and complaints from parents, including one who described Conner as "creepy".

“They are professionals. They are the ones who should understand that this is not acceptable, even the slightest appearance of impropriety should have been taken seriously,” Wright says.

Even though Conner had been fired from two previous YMCAs before working in Melrose, none of this information was passed along in a file or available in a national database of YMCA employees.

The 2,686 YMCAs across the country are not required to share information with each other; a national spokesperson says each is independent and autonomous. The national YMCA offers suggestions in forming hiring practices; however, the individual YMCA’s are not required to follow them.

Attorney and national victim's rights advocate, Wendy Murphy, calls this scandal an all-too-familiar story. “I think what we saw with the Y, what we've seen here with the Y, is what we've seen with too many other institutions including, for example, the Catholic church scandal. Empty files, we didn't know anything, it wasn't credible,” Murphy says.

In a letter sent to parents, Melrose YMCA president Richard Whitworth says the E.E.C. report is biased and contains factual errors.

He says James Conner passed a criminal background check, and had only one unfounded complaint with D.C.Y.F. He says he personally investigated many of the prior allegations against James Conner and determined them to be unfounded. He says he always thought Conner was a good employee, even though administrators from 2 other YMCAs raised serious concerns.

In the wake of this scandal, the director of the Melrose YMCA after-school program has been fired, and the E.E.C. has imposed several sanctions including an enrollment freeze.

“This is devastating, as it is for everybody. You don't sleep at night. You wake up in the middle of the night thinking about this. We're in the business of protecting children, helping them grow,”

Whitworth calls the situation with James Conner his worst nightmare, and based on the E.E.C. report, the questions will always linger, could more have been done?