THIRD OFFICIAL TO LEAVE STATE YOUTH AUTHORITY

SACRAMENTO - The superintendent of the state-run youth prison at Paso
Robles, where investigators are probing allegations of abuse against wards,
announced her resignation Wednesday.

Kate Thompson's departure marks the third retirement of a high-level
official from the California Youth Authority in two weeks.

Last month, as The Times published a report on alleged brutality by
officers at El Paso de Robles Youth Correctional Facility, Youth Authority
Director Gregorio Zermeno was ousted by the Davis administration, in part
because he failed to implement new restrictions on the use of force.

A few days later, Brian Rivera, a deputy director who was regarded as a
possible successor to Zermeno, announced his voluntary retirement. Rivera
had just been assigned to inspect the Youth Authority's 11 facilities to
ensure that the governor's new policies were being followed.

The agency has been under intense scrutiny from agents of state Inspector
General Steve White. Last fall, they found a pattern of abuse and brutality
at the Heman G. Stark Youth Correctional Facility in Chino, where officers
were allegedly setting up fights among wards.

White's office, along with internal affairs investigators from the Youth
Authority, is examining allegations that officers also arranged fights
among wards in a living unit at Paso Robles. They are also looking into
whether officers employed excessive force in sending handcuffed wards to
detention sessions in the prison gymnasium.

Thompson, who has overseen the prison for about eight years, declined to
discuss her departure from the institution halfway between Los Angeles and
San Francisco. In an interview last year, she defended the so-called gym TD
(temporary detention) practice as "the safest and most humane" way to
protect wards and staff after disturbances at her institution.

Thompson started with the Youth Authority in 1970 as a parole agent and had
served as superintendent at Paso Robles since Oct. 31, 1991. She was
previously assistant superintendent at the Ventura School, now called the
Ventura Youth Correctional Facility.

Stephen Green, a spokesman for the state Youth and Adult Correctional
Agency that oversees the Youth Authority, said Thompson's retirement had
been in the works for months.

State officials say that in coming months they expect other high-level
retirements from California correctional facilities, in part because of a
sweetened pension benefit available to veteran employees.

The Youth Authority is responsible for the state's toughest juvenile
criminals. It spends $427 million annually to house nearly 7,600 wards.

Times staff writer James Rainey contributed to this story.