Abuse case destroys single dad's image

Abuse case destroys single dad's image

Dec 18, 1988

St. Petersburg Times

BOYNTON BEACH - David Allen Lindsey Sr. had a talent for building objects and images.

As a carpenter, he built furniture and made free repairs around a Miami orphanage for years. As a rare single man allowed to adopt children, he put together a family of 11 boys. He developed the trust of child-welfare officials and of journalists who hailed him as a man breaking stereotypes.

Now, the same boys who filled his three-bedroom Boynton Beach home could tear down what's left of the world Lindsey built.

Two of his adoptive sons have agreed to testify in the sexual-abuse trial of the man they once called ``Dad.`` The two are Lindsey's 19-year-old namesake, David Jr., who is learning to live on his own now, and a 9-year-old adjusting to a new foster family.

Lindsey, free on bail and living with his wife of eight months in Ocala, faces nine counts of sexual assault against the two and an unidentified neighborhood boy. Conviction could bring life imprisonment. Lindsey was also charged Thursday with kidnapping and sexually assaulting a teen-age boy in 1987. The six new charges do not involve any of Lindsey's children or their friends.

Five other adopted sons recanted statements they made against Lindsey last year to Boynton Beach police.

Lindsey's trial is to begin soon in Circuit Court in West Palm Beach, though no date has been set. Meanwhile, the two adoptive brothers have filed civil suits against the 42-year-old man and agencies involved in the adoptions, seeking monetary awards.

``He is an animal,`` said Sgt. David Nissensohn of the Boynton Beach Police Department, which led the probe of Lindsey last year. ``He has destroyed the lives of many boys and belongs behind bars.``

Not long ago, people spoke quite differently about Lindsey, calling him a self-sacrificing savior who opened his home to the most troubled, needy boys, many of them youths who had gone from one foster home to another after neglect or abuse by their parents.

The boys Lindsey adopted were all under 14 years old, most between 7 and 12, when adopted. All are now either on their own or placed with foster families.

In 1969, Lindsey's request to adopt a son was met with astonishment. Single-parent homes were less common then, and an unmarried man seeking to adopt was a particular curiosity.

Lindsey, however, was relentless. He argued that a single man could be a fine parent and provide a loving home. After two years of volunteering time at the state-funded Children's Home Society orphanage in Miami, he was given his first son, Ray.

By 1981, Lindsey's family had grown to five boys, the fifth being David Jr.

The boys never had a complaint for outsiders.

``Looking back now, it's hard to see how someone didn't question the arrangement,`` said Becky Walker, supervisor of children's services for the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, referring to Lindsey's request only for white, preadolescent boys.

Evelyn Cassidy, the counselor who arranged most of Lindsey's adoptions at the Children's Home, has temporarily been assigned to a new job at the agency until the trial is completed. She declined to comment on Lindsey or the charges.

The storm of allegations against Lindsey began to brew during a series of quarrels with David Jr. in early 1987. The boy eventually left the house and, after two days away, was about to call Lindsey for forgiveness.

Instead, he telephoned the Rev. Neil Hickem and his wife at the First Baptist Church in Delray Beach, where Lindsey used to take his sons nearly every Sunday.

On a night in May 1987, David Jr. told the couple his adoptive father masturbated and performed oral sex on the boys, whom he claimed often slept with Lindsey. The abuse usually ended when the boys reached late puberty, he said.

``I don't think I know how to love,`` David Jr. has told the Miami Herald.

``Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if this had never happened, if I had been adopted by a different family,`` he said. ``I wonder if I would have gone to college. I wonder if I would have gotten married and had children. It's hard for me to imagine now what will happen.``

The day after he talked with the Hickems, David Jr. again told his story to Boynton Beach detectives, and the tale was corroborated by five other adoptive brothers, police said. But eventually all but David Jr. would recant their tape-recorded stories.

Three months before, a boy from nearby Lake Worth had identified Lindsey as the man who had offered him money for sex, said police. The boy, however, did not wish to press charges.

Police later found a neighborhood boy who claimed Lindsey had twice assaulted him and gave him a motorcycle to remain silent.

Lindsey was arrested on June 3, 1987.

Prosecutors now have an extensive witness list that includes former neighbors and associates of Lindsey, said Mary Greene, a spokeswoman for the crimes against children division of the state attorney general's office.

``We do not expect a plea,`` she said. ``We intend to prosecute.`