The City of Syracuse is launching an investigation into the hiring of an employee accused of child sex abuse and rape, and who was on the state’s Level 3 sex offender list after serving prison time for child sexual abuse charges. The city will also conduct deeper background checks on all potential city employees going forward.
Mayor Sharon Owens says she only found out about the arrest of 45-year-old James DeSantis Monday morning. He was arrested by the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Department after a person alerted 911 to the presence of an adult man and a child in a vehicle.
Owens says she was shocked by what she heard and immediately conferred with the city’s attorney before firing DeSantis from his job as a crew leader in the Department of Public Works. Owens says he was hired in 2017 and promoted in 2024. Owens says she’s limited about what she can say about the case legally, but called this “the worst possible scenario.
"I’m angry," said Owens. "I’m very angry and I spent my life protecting children and working with families. And this quite frankly is p***ing me off. And that’s what I want to say."
She says when it’s done, the city will release details of the investigation into the hiring of DeSantis, and who, if anyone, knew about his place on the state’s sex abuse registry.
In the meantime, Owens has ordered that the city’s hiring practice be changed immediately to include background checks for all new hires. Currently, background checks are only conducted for parks, police and building trades applicants.
"We do reference checks, but now we're talking about background checks. And very specifically looking for child registry, sex registry, violent crime, certain levels of death because of the sensitivity of some departments. And there are a couple other areas we're going to be looking at," said Owens.
Owens says this doesn’t mean Syracuse will no longer be a “second-chance city,” which means hiring individuals who may have a criminal record. "Now we've had individuals in certain departments that may have had issues with the law. Sometimes it's violently. The answer to that depends on what it was. How long it's been. What have they been doing since then? And that is where I think the second chance comes in.
"I think this new hiring structure is going to give us standardized questions to ask people. Giving people an opportunity who want to get a restart, but ensuring they're not going to be a danger to the people of the city."
Owens says a month ago she began meeting with city officials about updating hiring practices.
