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Before James Conner allegedly raped two girls while working at the Melrose YMCA, he worked at the Andover-North Andover YMCA and slept next to a young girl, let kids sit on his lap and nicknamed a girl "Princess," according to interviews and state documents.
Staff members at the Andover-North Andover YMCA reported Conner's conduct to their superiors and Conner was fired from the facility in 2001, after having worked there since 1995, according to Stephen Ives, president and CEO of Merrimack Valley YMCA.
The Melrose YMCA hired him shortly after his firing here. He was arrested on child rape and pornography charges in February, according to two recently released reports from the state Department of Early Education and Care.
"It's unbelievable," said Michael Tibaudo, who worked as a counselor-in-training at the Andover-North Andover YMCA and reported Conner's "weird" behavior to his supervisor.
The state reports do not levy allegations of sexual abuse against Conner during his time working at the Andover-North Andover YMCA. But they explain that staff there raised warning flags about his unusually close contact with children.
Now, the 51-year-old North Reading resident is facing more than 20 sex-related charges involving victims from the Melrose YMCA. The charges include forcible child rape committed against two victims he coached in girls basketball and multiple child pornography crimes for using hidden cameras to film his assaults. The girls were younger than 14 at the time, according to a press release from Middlesex County District Attorney Gerry Leone's office.
Conner has posted bail and is being monitored by GPS, according to Leone's press release.
Attempts to reach Conner and his attorney, Alan Tuttman, were unsuccessful. A young man at Conner's house Friday afternoon said Conner wasn't likely to have a comment.
A history of 'inappropriate' conduct
After Conner's arrest, Anne Daly-Conners, an investigator for the Department of Early Education and Care, interviewed administrators at the Melrose YMCA and reviewed Conner's personnel record. She learned Conner was fired from not only the Andover-North Andover YMCA, but also the Reading YMCA.
A former administrator in Reading told Daly-Conners about allegations that Conner "rented a bus for an end-of-the-year party" and "drank alcohol and smoked marijuana with the 15- and 16-year-old counselors," according to Daly-Conners' report.
"He was immediately fired, but the young counselors wrote letters denying the incident ever occurred," she wrote.
The Reading YMCA fired Conner in December 1995. He was already working at the Andover-North Andover YMCA as a site coordinator by that point, having started there on Sept. 1, 1995.
Karen Dauteuil, vice president of child care services for the Melrose YMCA, told Daly-Conners she was aware Conner was fired from the Andover-North Andover YMCA.
Dauteuil told the investigator that Conner told her he was fired because a child "jumped on his lap" while riding a bus, the report said.
The investigator spoke to three former administrators of the Andover-North Andover YMCA, two of whom reported warning the Melrose YMCA about Conner.
One administrator said she told Nancy Madden, senior vice president of the Melrose YMCA, that Conner played "favorites" with one child, and let children sit on his lap on the bus.
The other administrator said she called Dauteuil and said she would "never hire him." That woman said she recalled two counselors in-training approaching her after a sleepover in the YMCA gym in Andover during the summer of 2001. The workers said Conner slept on an air mattress with a young girl, the report said.
The girl, during an interview with investigators, said "that although boys were separated from the girls, Jim slept 'next' to her during the sleepovers at the YMCA, but did not sleep on the same mattress," the report said.
Dauteuil said she only remembered being told "Jim was terminated for a child sitting on his lap," Daly-Conners wrote.
The Andover-North Andover YMCA reported Conner to the Department of Early Education and Care when it fired him. They reported that he demonstrated a pattern of favoritism toward one child, that he had that child sit on his lap on two bus rides and had "been observed with his arm around her in the pool," Daly-Conners' report said.
The Andover-North Andover YMCA had reprimanded Conner for the behavior a few weeks prior, but he continued his "inappropriateness," Daly-Conners' report said.
Tibaudo, the former counselor-in-training, said the girl Conner favored was about 8 to 10 at the time and attended summer camp at the Andover facility.
"He was always bumping her up to the front of the line," said Tibaudo, a 2005 graduate of North Andover High School who is now a 21-year-old Northeastern University student. "He kept calling this girl 'Princess.' All the other kids were getting infuriated."
Ives, who is in charge of the Andover-North Andover YMCA, said his staff did the right thing by reporting Conner to their superiors, firing him, reporting him to the state and then warning Melrose.
"I can hold my head high knowing that my staff, the part that we're responsible for, did an extraordinary job of management and oversight," he said.
"It appears as though the Andover Y responded appropriately," said Constantia Papanikolaou, general counsel for the Department of Early Eduction and Care.
Melrose YMCA reprimanded
The Melrose YMCA administrators knew about Conner's alleged inappropriate actions and still hired him, "and that is a concern" to the state, Papanikolaou said.
The Department of Early Education and Care levied several sanctions against the Melrose YMCA, including freezing its enrollment and increasing oversight and training.
Melrose YMCA President Richard Whitworth said the Conner case "is a tragedy for everybody.
"Our hearts and concern go out to the children and the families of his victims," he said. "I think that it's a tragedy of our society that a man could be living amongst us and perpetrate these heinous acts on children. The YMCA, since this happened, has been focused on ensuring that nothing like this will happen again."
The Melrose YMCA serves children from 144 families, and four families have withdrawn since Conner's arrest, Whitworth said.
"We're working on rebuilding the trust that the community has always had in the YMCA," he said.
The national YMCA headquarters in Chicago did not return a call seeking comment, and instead released this statement: "We are dismayed to learn that a former YMCA employee has been arrested for allegedly molesting a girl while at YMCA programs. Our thoughts and prayers are with the alleged victim and her family. We understand that an investigation is ongoing, and as such, we are not able to comment further."
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