To Hug a Porcupine

Jorge remembers the classes that prospective foster and adoptive parents were required to take. "It was a weeding-out process," he says. Some people seemed motivated by the financial boost they could get from fostering, a few hundred dollars per child per month. "You could tell they were thinking: Am I going to work at McDonald's or do foster care?" Many participants were scared away when they heard about the challenges that might lie ahead. "I think our class started with 45 people in it," Jorge recalls. "There were eight at the end."

Debbie and Jorge, though, felt well-prepared for more kids. Their first adopted son was a black child whose mother had died of cancer and whom they knew through their church. Debbie had been a teacher and principal at a school for children with special needs; Jorge was a successful salesman and youth minister. A study conducted by DCF described a loving and idyllic family with a lively cast of animals: three cats, dogs who were used for pet therapy with disabled children, and Merlin, an African gray parrot who "sounds exactly like Jorge."

It said right there on the home study: To complement their mixed family, Debbie and Jorge were open to accepting children — they could probably take one or two — with "mild-to-moderate medical, developmental, and/or behavioral needs." Debbie says now that, because they already had a son, they specified "absolutely no sexual acting out at all." They turned down a few children with behavior problems they didn't feel they could handle.

Then one day, DCF adoption specialist Zuclich came to tell them about three amazing little boys — the sort who rarely ever became available. According to Debbie, "She said, 'I'm not supposed to show you, but here is their picture.' " The couple was hooked.

Debbie remembers the first few meals with the boys. "They were grabbing fistfuls of spaghetti," she says. They didn't understand the concept of utensils. They hoarded food. When she helped them take baths, she noticed they were skinny and bruised, "like refugees."

Other signs were more disturbing. Brian, the oldest boy, suffered from nightmares. Matthew maintained an air of defiance, never, ever acknowledging blame. Little James was always biting. All three wet their beds and seemed obsessed with grabbing at each other's genitals as though it were some sort of power play. "They would rage and scream for two to three hours at a time at the top of their lungs," Debbie says. Each boy could be cruel to pet cats and dogs.

With a therapist's help, Debbie and Jorge learned coping techniques. They let the boys take food to their rooms until the hoarding stopped. They set a rule to stay arm's length apart. To deal with extreme tantrums, the parents calmed the boys by sitting them in a chair and physically retraining them, wrapping their arms around from behind.

About six months after the adoption, Debbie was cleaning the house and moving furniture around. The bed made a squeak. Little James, then 4, looked terrified.

That was the sound he heard before the bad man came to get him, he muttered. Upon further questioning, he reported: "Hector slept with me." Hector Rosa was his former foster dad.

"I pulled Matthew aside, and he told me the same story," Debbie says. The bed always made a telltale squeak when Rosa lifted himself off one boy and went for the next.

Hector Rosa was a DCF-vetted foster parent who had been in charge of Brian, Matthew, and James just before their adoption.

The three boys moved in with Debbie and Jorge, making way for an 11-year-old girl. According to court documents, Rosa customarily passed out on the recliner in his small house in Palm Springs. From there, he said, he could best guard the eight kids. "Hector the Protector," his wife liked to call him.

A police report notes that it was nearly midnight in December 1998 when Hector's wife, Yolanda, roused herself from bed to grab a bottle for the 1-year-old baby. She stumbled into the living room and was surprised not to see Hector. She padded over to one of the kids' rooms. Yolanda turned the doorknob.

She looked at the bottom bunk. Then screamed.

"I can't believe you did this!" she yelled.

"It's not what you think!" Hector shouted, jumping up.

Yolanda lurched for the phone and dialed 911. "I just caught my husband molesting one of the foster children!" she cried hysterically. "I just caught him!" She recounted what she had seen: Her husband, a 49-year-old property manager, 5-foot-9 and around 200 pounds, under the blue sheets, moving his hips. Beneath him: the 11-year-old foster girl.

Hector ran to the bathroom and vomited on the floor.

By the time two officers arrived, Rosa had abandoned his plaid, semen-stained boxer shorts and thrown on a pair of jeans. He nervously rattled on about how sorry and embarrassed he was. He insisted there'd been no penetration. One of the officers read him his Miranda rights. Still, he continued to babble. He told the police he'd fondled the girl on about eight occasions.