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Sordid details emerge from misconduct report of public agency head

3 years 3 months 5 days ago Friday, August 20 2021 Aug 20, 2021 August 20, 2021 4:43 PM August 20, 2021 in News
Source: WBRZ

BATON ROUGE - The man in charge of the public agency responsible for regulating private security in the state of Louisiana is accused of misconduct in a lengthy report obtained by the WBRZ Investigative Unit.

Fabian Blache III is on leave and under investigation by the Office of the State Inspector General.

"Two or three weeks ago, we received a package from the board attorney alerting us of potential wrongdoing and misconduct," District Attorney Hillar Moore said.

Watch the report live on News 2 at 6:00

At the Louisiana State Board of Private Security Examiners, Blache was nowhere to be found Friday. He's on leave as the allegations of wrongdoing are investigated. Although he was missing from his office, our cameras captured all of his personal effects still inside, including a world map of a trip that he was proud to show off.

This week, the WBRZ Investigative Unit obtained documents showing Fabian Blache III used public funds to take his wife on a trip to Africa when he was attending a conference. He wrote a personal check to refund his wife's portion of the plane ticket, but there was a note attached to the check in his personnel file that Blache did not give permission to cash it.

The documents also show he hired a woman who apparently did no work for the agency, but was engaged to his brother and having an affair with his wife. She was issued a check for $2,500.

Blache also hired a close associate who was arrested for contractor fraud but was granted an instructor's license, which some experts believe violates the law.

"At this point what we agreed to among our offices is to have the inspector general do the investigation," District Attorney Moore said. "Instead of having multiple agencies interview witnesses over and over again, creating multiple statements."

We reached Blache by phone Friday. He denied any wrongdoing despite what the misconduct report shows. He declined to do an interview and referred all questions to his attorney.

"Surely the allegations warrant an aggressive investigation," Moore said. "I believe you'll see that from the inspector general. There's a lot of work to be done and a lot of people to be interviewed and a lot of documents to look at."

Last month, the WBRZ Investigative Unit exposed Blache is also in trouble accused of sexual harassment. He allegedly exposed himself to a coworker on a work trip and threatened to fire the employee when she turned down his sexual advances.

Multiple sources said Blache's clout in the community and his family's close connections to law enforcement have them fearing he'll get a free pass.

"His father is an outstanding man," Moore said. "As is his family. Everyone knows that going in, and they would not, in my opinion, interject themselves into any of this."

Blache's lawyer did not return our phone calls Friday.

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