Starting in the late 1990s, the complaints by young girls incarcerated at Camp Scott began to pile up — all alleging similar sexual abuse by the same man: Thomas E. Jackson, then a deputy at the Santa Clarita juvenile camp.
Eventually, the complaints all stalled. The girls finished their sentences and left. Jackson stayed for decades.
It wasn’t until this fall that Jackson resigned from the Los Angeles County Probation Department, capping a 33-year career during which 20 women say he sexually abused them when they were girls. His last day was Sept. 28.
Ernest Walker, a longtime probation supervisor, resigned two days later, also after 33 years with the department. His departure would come nearly two decades after he was accused of having sex with a teenage girl he supervised.
Faced with roughly 1,500 plaintiffs accusing the county of tolerating unchecked sexual abuse at its juvenile facilities, the Probation Department has spent the last two years removing alleged sexual abusers from its ranks. Since early 2022, 23 probation staffers — including Walker and Jackson — have been placed on leave after accusations of sexual violence, according to figures provided by the county’s outside counsel.
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