California residents seeking addiction treatment were never told that an Orange County program's manager had been convicted of statutory rape and that a state agency had recommended that the center be shut down, the Sacramento Bee reported April 3.

MedPro Treatment Center continued to accept patients and retained its top rating from the Better Business Bureau even though the state Department of Social Services had banned two of the program's owners for life and cited the center for multiple violations.

MedPro also continued to be listed as a program in good standing with the state Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs; the department just recently began requiring drug counselors to register with the state, and does not routinely disclose information on program misconduct to the public, the Bee reported. A lawyer for the department cited patient confidentiality concerns as being behind the policy.

That stance did not satisfy parent Cathi Taylor, who spent $22,000 to send her teenage daughter to MedPro last year. "Something should have been published on (the department's) Web site for the protection of other teenage girls, as well as the pocketbooks of the already traumatized parents of these kids," she said.

Taylor said her daughter Stephanie often complained about MedPro, but program officials said Stephanie was "just trying to find faults with the program."

The state Department of Social Services began investigating MedPro in 2003 after receiving complaints about sexual harassment at the facility. House manager Michael Jerry Escarcica, Jr., was subsequently convicted of statutory rape involving a patient, and settled a molestation case filed by another patient out of court. The agency also charged that MedPro allowed counselors with criminal records to work with teens and reported a number of other violations.

The agency said it reported its investigation to the Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs in 2003. The Department of Social Services said it will start issuing press releases whenever it investigates a program.

MedPro surrendered its adult residential treatment license in 2005 and changed its name to the Center for Dual Diagnosis Treatment. It remains in business as an outpatient program and sober house. Two former administrators banned from Department of Social Services programs still retain ties to the company.