Children left in molester’s care

Fearing the defendant was dangerous and might flee the state, Maui prosecutors in 2012 opposed the supervised release of Zack Morris, who was facing multiple counts of sexually abusing two foster children while under his care. Prosecutors had good reason to be concerned.

Morris, who was 30 at the time, embraced a double identity. His 2003 passport was under his birth name, Florentino Rios Jr., but his Hawaii driver’s license was under the moniker Zack Morris, who was a mischievous teenage character in the early 1990s television sitcom "Saved by the Bell."

The former New York resident was so enamored by the TV personality — played by actor Mark-Paul Gosselaar — that he also bleached his skin and changed his hair and eye color to be more like the character, according to court documents.

In an April 2012 motion opposing Morris’ supervised release, Maui Deputy Prosecutor Simone Polak referred to multiple red flags, including the defendant’s dual identity, failure to abide by a court order to surrender his passport and the trips he took without his wife "to such exotic places as Panama and Ukraine, places well-known for their sex tourism."

Morris also was unemployed, had been the target of a previous child abuse investigation in New York and got married in 2002 in Puerto Rico to a girl who was only 14 or 15, according to court documents. He was 22 at the time.

Yet despite such a history, the state Department of Human Services issued him a license — under the Morris name — to be a foster parent, sometime after he moved here from New York in 2008. Within about a year, he already was molesting his first foster child.

In December 2013, Morris pleaded no contest to several counts of sexually assaulting three boys placed in his care at different times by DHS. The abuse on Maui spanned from March 2009 to August 2011.

Morris was prosecuted under that name, but court documents also refer to Rios as his AKA — also known as. It’s unclear whether he legally changed his name.

Morris was sentenced in February to 20 years in prison and is incarcerated at the Halawa Correctional Facility.

The Morris case has many bizarre aspects, and court documents in the criminal proceeding and several civil ones portray a man with a history of mental issues.

At one point in the criminal case, he was found to be unfit to proceed. And at his February sentencing hearing he told the judge that he "loved every child," that many of the prisoners he met while incarcerated needed to be loved instead of put "in a cell to rot," and that everything harmful in the world, including the military, guns and bombs, should be abolished.

SYSTEM FAILURE

Beyond the strange facets of Morris’ background, the case raises questions about the screening process used by DHS to license foster parents and to determine where to temporarily place abused and neglected children who are removed from their homes. Maui Deputy Prosecutor Kim Whitworth, recalling the trauma experienced by Morris’ first victim, told the judge at the sentencing hearing that Hawaii’s Child Welfare Services system failed the boy.

"He was shocked that the very people who were supposed to protect him were the ones who placed him with the defendant," Whitworth said, according to a transcript of the hearing.

Two of Morris’ three victims have since sued the state, claiming DHS was negligent in not adequately evaluating his fitness to be a foster parent and not providing sufficient oversight while they were in foster care, including ignoring warning signs that Morris was a pedophile. The lawsuit is pending.

"The selection of a safe foster home begins with the screening process," said Jon Jacobs, one of two attorneys representing the two victims, in an email to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. "Our case shows that DHS failed to provide a safe home for our clients and allowed a pedophiliac sexual predator to not only select and groom his child victims, but also to bully the state into providing more victims to him, despite numerous red flags indicating his true intentions."

The bullying allegation refers to a June 2010 lawsuit in which Morris and his wife accused the state of discrimination for not placing more children with him. The lawsuit, which was filed after one child had been placed with Morris but before others were, eventually was dismissed.

DHS declined to respond to questions about Morris and how he was able to get a license, citing the pending litigation and a state law making foster parent files confidential. It wouldn’t even confirm the year Morris received his license.

In an email to the Star-Advertiser, DHS spokeswoman Kayla Rosenfeld said the agency staff strives to provide the best service possible to families who need assistance maintaining a healthy home environment.

"They do incredible work with limited resources," she wrote. "As such, the DHS aims for transparency. But as you know, when a case is under active litigation, like the Zack Morris case, the DHS is advised by the Office of the Attorney General against providing any comment." The lack of disclosure means many questions about the case cannot be publicly answered yet. If the civil lawsuit goes to trial, more details are expected to be disclosed.

SECOND VICTIM

What is known from piecing together information from court documents and other sources presents a disturbing picture.

The department, for instance, placed Morris’ second victim with him in October 2010 even though a bench warrant had been issued for Morris’ arrest the previous month, according to the lawsuit filed by the two victims and traffic court records. The Sept. 23, 2010, bench warrant was issued because Morris failed to appear at a court hearing involving a traffic accident he caused, court records show.

The second victim was subjected to repeated sexual assaults on a daily basis, according to the lawsuit.

Rosenfeld said DHS does not get access to bench warrant information.

The second victim also was placed with Morris even though DHS had investigated Morris and confirmed that he threatened to abuse or neglect a prior foster child, according to a lawsuit Morris filed against the state that eventually was dismissed. Morris unsuccessfully sued for damages due to what he called a wrongful investigation. He noted in the lawsuit that DHS’ finding that he made a threat was overturned on appeal.

Yet Morris in his complaint said DHS continued to treat him and his wife as if they were suspects instead of foster parents.

DHS placed two more boys, both of whom were sexually abused, after Morris filed that complaint and one other unsuccessful lawsuit against DHS workers, court documents show.

While Rosenfeld would not comment on the Morris case, she said in general that an overturned allegation would not disqualify someone from being a foster parent. The department would discuss the matter with the foster parent and do an assessment, she said.

Maui attorney Ben Herren, who represented Morris at the February sentencing hearing and in September before the Hawaii Paroling Authority, did not respond to Star-Advertiser phone messages, including a request to speak with Morris.

The authority determined that Morris will be eligible for parole in October 2023.

PUZZLING EXCEPTION

One of the key criteria DHS is required to use when deciding to license a new applicant or re-certify an existing foster parent — recertifi­ca­tions are required at least every two years — is whether the person demonstrates the ability to provide safe and appropriate care.

As part of the process, DHS is required to conduct criminal and child abuse background checks, review employment history, inspect the home and perform other measures to determine whether the applicant is fit to be a foster parent.

DHS relies on hundreds of foster parents each year to care for Hawaii’s abused and neglected children. In the vast majority of cases, the kids are well cared for, advocates say.

Federal data back that up. For the past several years, Hawaii has been among the six states with the lowest rates of confirmed maltreatment involving children in foster care, according to the data.

That makes the Morris case all the more puzzling, child advocates say. Either he was extremely good at gaming the system or DHS dropped the ball multiple times, they say.

"They usually rake through everything with a fine-tooth comb," said Raynette Ah Chong of DHS’ licensing review process. Ah Chong received her foster license more than 20 years ago and has been subjected to regular background checks since then.

Among other things, Hawaii law requires DHS to check child abuse registries in all states where an applicant has lived within the previous five years.

Before moving to Hawaii, Morris was investigated by the New York state agency that handles child abuse cases, according to court documents.

Whitworth, the Maui deputy prosecutor, said at Morris’ sentencing hearing that the defendant was familiar with CPS systems because "he had been through it with his own children" in New York, according to the hearing transcript. Morris has two children with his wife.

A spokeswoman for the New York agency that handles child abuse investigations told the Star-Adver­­tiser that information about such cases is confidential. But she said her agency, if asked, would share information about prospective foster parents with child- protective entities from other states as long as the disclosure falls within federal guidelines.

During the criminal proceedings, Morris told authorities that he had been unable to get a job since suffering a work injury in New York. After he and his family moved from Maui to Kauai in September 2011, his wife told authorities that she was staying in a homeless shelter "pending possible housing," according to a court bail study.

Given what appeared to be his shaky finances and jobless status, it is unclear how Morris met the income standard required for obtaining a foster license.

According to state law, an applicant must have sufficient financial resources to maintain an adequate standard of living for the family — before the addition of a foster child.

Once Morris obtained his license, DHS ignored or did not follow up on repeated warning signs that he was unfit to be a foster parent, according to the victims’ lawsuit.

Whitworth told the court that Morris targeted special-needs children who had lost hope in their families, the system and themselves. His youngest victim was 10, the others 15 and 16. Two were brothers.

One victim was sexually abused after Morris plied the boy with tequila until he passed out, Whitworth said. Morris told the boy that no one would believe him if he tried to report the abuse, she added. Another victim was repeatedly abused, forced to watch pornographic videos and locked in an empty room, according to the civil lawsuit.

Circuit Judge Rhonda Loo, who presided over the sentencing, chastised Morris for taking advantage of such vulnerable children and showing no remorse, even telling authorities at one point that the sex was consensual. Loo lauded the boys for reporting the abuse.

If they hadn’t, "your history of raping children would have continued for who knows how long, especially as a foster parent," the judge told Morris.