By Kurt Streeter
Los Angeles Times
February 27, 2004
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority agreed Thursday to pay $1.85 million to a teenager who was molested by a bus driver in Hollywood nearly three years ago.
The payment settles a lawsuit that followed the conviction of former MTA driver Anthony Zaragoza, who pleaded guilty to molesting a 15-year-old boy and was sentenced to nearly 30 years in prison. Alone with the boy on June 20, 2001, Zaragoza drove his bus to a Hollywood side street and began making sexual advances. The boy, a North Carolina resident who was visiting Los Angeles, secretly turned on a video camera he was carrying and recorded the assault.
It compounded troubles for the MTA that Zaragoza had been hired by the transit agency's predecessor, the Southern California Rapid Transit District, even though he had been convicted of armed robbery in 1980. After the assault, the MTA revised its hiring policy. It no longer hires convicted felons. The MTA's board agreed to the settlement in a closed meeting.
David Ring, the boy's lawyer, said the MTA had acted reasonably, particularly because his client has been battling an unrelated, life-threatening medical problem since the assault. "They could have just dragged this thing on and put my client through the wringer," he said.
