Story Published:
Feb 6, 2009 at 6:38 PM PDT
Story Updated:
Mar 20, 2009 at 1:19 PM PDT
LOS ANGELES — The convicted rapist hired at a county health center after he was previously fired for having a criminal record got his job through a medical staffing agency, county CEO William Fujioka said Friday.
After Gariner Beasley, 48, was fired in August, he filled in at Edward Roybal Comprehensive Health Center in East Los Angeles for about 15 to 18 days, starting in late December and ending with his termination last Tuesday, Fujioka said.
Beasley was hired for the temporary position through Mediscan Staffing Services, a medical staffing agency with clients throughout the region, he said.
A spokeswoman for Mediscan did not return calls.
Fujioka, who has been trying to determine what happened, said he has identified the supervisor who cleared Beasley’s rehiring but declined to disclose the name because the person was “subject to disciplinary action.”
Before being hired to do temporary work at the facility, Beasley was required to disclose his previous employment with the county and why he left, Fujioka said.
“His initial clearance [to work] was not in accordance with county policy,” Fujioka said.
Since Beasley’s return to a county health facility became known, members of the county Board of Supervisors have publicly voiced their anger.
Supervisor Michael Antonovich called the rehiring “grounds for dismissal.”
“It is unconscionable that the county staff violated the hiring protocol and allowed this rapist to slip through the cracks and get rehired at a county medical facility,” Antonovich said.
Supervisor Don Knabe said “what concerns me most ... is the utter failure of the human resources system to prevent this from happening in the first place. The Board of Supervisors has made it very clear that background checks and criminal checks need to be performed without question on anyone interacting with our patients.”
The news of Beasley’s return to work at a county health facility was published in the Los Angeles Times one day after Antonovich called for county CEO William Fujioka to report on how the county is dealing with employees with criminal backgrounds.
Antonovich was reacting to a Times investigation that found Beasley — a former Los Angeles police officer who was fired after being convicted of raping women while on duty — was hired even though officials were aware of his criminal background.
Both the head of hospital human resources and a chief aide signed papers saying his conviction should not be an obstacle to working as an X-ray technologist, the newspaper reported.
Fujioka said he could not confirm whether the same supervisor who allowed Beasley to return was the one who fired him Tuesday.
“County staff who knowingly approve hiring without criminal background checks — in direct violation of procedures adopted by the Board of Supervisors — are jeopardizing the public’s safety and should be fired,” Antonovich said.
Fujioka is scheduled to deliver his report during the board’s meeting next Tuesday, but he declined to comment Friday on the latest developments.
A county audit disclosed last summer that 11 percent of the staff at King-Harbor Hospital, where Beasley previously worked, had serious criminal records.
Beasley was fired at King-Harbor last summer after news broke of his criminal record.
RSS Feeds 
