The Advocate ONLINE, January 8, 2000

Former Juvenile Detention Center head indicted on charge of obscenity
By Bob Anderson

Florida parishes bureau

AMITE -- A Tangipahoa Parish grand jury indicted the former head of the Florida Parishes Juvenile Detention Center on a charge of obscenity.

However, the grand jury returned a no true bill on John V. Baiamonte Jr. on a more serious charge of crime against nature, a spokeswoman for the 21st Judicial District Attorneys Office reported Friday.

Baiamonte resigned his post in November after he was arrested during a sting operation that employed an undercover policewoman posing as a prostitute in Hammond.

Police arrested Baiamonte after they said he exposed himself to the undercover policewoman. Officers said she was working an area where incidents of sexual solicitation had occurred in the past.

If convicted of obscenity, Baiamonte faces up to three years in prison and a fine of as much as $2,500, said Brenda Bickford, a spokeswoman for the district attorney.

He was the second head of the detention center to be arrested on morals counts in a little more than two years.

The former head of the center, Wayne E. Summers Sr. was arrested in 1997 on counts of molesting two juveniles who were inmates at the center. Summers subsequently was convicted and sentenced to serve 42 months in prison.

The center in Robert houses male juvenile inmates from several surrounding parishes.

The 32-bed detention center is a state-owned facility operated by the Florida Parishes Juvenile Justice Commission.