‘This is horrible for me.’ Former Fresno State VP Lamas speaks out on Castro, allegations
Frank Lamas considered Joseph I. Castro a friend and someone who could help him reach the pinnacle of college administration — a university presidency.
Today, Lamas says his career is in tatters, and Castro is under scrutiny for how he handled disciplining Lamas through repeated sexual harassment allegations during his tenure as a Fresno State vice president.
The stakes are high. Lamas walked away with a $260,000 payoff and a glowing letter of reference from Castro despite a mountain of evidence against him. Castro, just a year into his tenure as California State University chancellor, is facing questions and a possible inquiry from a state senator.
Lamas talked for the first time since a USA Today investigation published Thursday. In an exclusive interview with The Bee, he called his time at Fresno State “horrible” and maintained that he never did anything wrong.
Castro quietly arranged a settlement with Lamas for him to leave the university with $260,000 and retirement benefits after years of alleged sexual harassment. And that occurred soon before Castro left his post as Fresno State president and took his new job to oversee the entire CSU system, the nation’s largest four-year public university with 23 campuses and more than 485,000 students.
Castro received a majority of the complaints, which alleged Lamas stared at women’s breasts, touched women inappropriately and made sexist remarks, as well as berated, belittled, and retaliated against employees. Some complaints about his behavior date back to 2014 — soon after he started his job as Fresno State vice president for student affairs & enrollment management. The allegations were found to be credible by outside investigators in two separate investigations.
Lamas: Investigative process not fair
However, Lamas says he believes the investigative process wasn’t fair, and most of the interviews from people who provided positive feedback about him weren’t taken into account. He says he even offered to submit to a lie-detector test but wasn’t allowed the opportunity.
“This has been, professionally, the most horrible thing that has ever gone down in my career,” he told The Bee. “I maintain my innocence and I’m not going to change that opinion no matter what anybody writes or says.”
Lamas says he came to Fresno State after meeting Castro in Washington, D.C., a number of times at conferences of the American Council on Education for aspiring university presidents.
Castro, he says, knew of his work at the University of Texas, Arlington, and wanted him to improve student success, program and services, and facilities at Fresno State. Lamas had worked at other college campuses, such as the Rochester Institute of Technology in upstate New York and Youngstown State University in Ohio.
“He saw that as my strength,” Lamas, who is in his 60s, said. “We made an agreement that if I got through the process and got the job, that after that, he would help me to find a presidency after maybe three years.”
Through their years together at Fresno State, Lamas said, they became close colleagues and went to many university events together.
“I considered him a close colleague, and a friend,” he said. “If you are asking if I think he gave me preferential treatment, I don’t think so.”
Ready to quit, but Castro changed his mind
The first complaint against Lamas in 2014, like others, went straight to Castro in the form of an anonymous letter. Lamas says it accused him of carousing and drinking with staff at the university.
“I’m not a drinker. I’m not a carouser,” he says. “I knew that was a lie. He (Castro) knew that was a lie. But still, it was worrisome that somebody would say those things about me, and do it anonymously.”
The second anonymous complaint came just a few months later. He says it accused him of saying, “something to the effect of, ‘Hey, baby, you are looking sexy today.’” He says he denied making such statement to anyone on campus, and has been happily married for 22 years.
Lamas says he was ready to quit Fresno State after that; during a one-on-one meeting with Castro, he told the then-Fresno State president that maybe he should consider becoming a faculty member on campus, or start applying for new jobs.
“At that point, it was more like, ‘no, just keep doing ... moving forward,’” he says. “We both felt this would stop at some point. People would get used to me, and that I was a hard-charging, get-it-done, wanting to be excellent, best practices and everything.”
Lamas stayed and the complaints kept pouring in, including an official Title IX complaint filed in October 2019 that would later trigger the two separate investigations, and prompted the university to place Lamas on administrative leave in early November 2019.
The 2019 complaint, Lamas says, resurrected the prior complaints, . He says he was always cooperative, and attended counseling sessions and made changes in his office.
The 2019 complaint was a bombshell, alleging that Lamas offered to help the employee get a promotion in exchange for sexual favors.
The person who filed the 2019 complaint, he says, is a staff member with whom he would attend professional and social outings with, such as having dinner with this person and Lamas’ wife. Lamas says he tried to advance this person’s career, but HR wouldn’t allow it.
Lamas says in retrospect, if he would have known what was going to happen, he would have left the university.
“This is horrible for me. It’s horrible for my family,” he says. “If I knowingly ever did anything to hurt anybody, in any way, shape or form, I would be the first one to apologize.”
Lamas appealed the findings of the investigations to the CSU Chancellor’s Office on April 23, 2020.
A copy of the appeal, provided to The Bee by Lamas, says the outcome of the investigation is not supported by evidence. It says both the independent investigator and Fresno State’s Title IX office, “failed to properly evaluate the evidence in three major respects,” such as not taking into account his history of professional and personal accomplishment.
His appeal was denied.
After the denial, he says, Fresno State offered him three months’ pay — which he and his attorney thought was unfair, so they threatened to sue the university. Fresno State then suggested they go to mediation, and the settlement came from that, he says.
Lamas retired on Dec. 31, 2020, and Castro provided him a letter of recommendation for jobs. Lamas says they haven’t talked since. Castro has been highly criticized for his handling of the complaints, and on Friday a state senator called for him to be investigated.
Praise in letter of reference
In the Dec. 7, 2020, recommendation letter, Castro speaks highly of Lamas, and provides examples of improvements he made on campus.
“The student experience at Fresno State will be forever improved because of Dr. Lamas’ bold leadership,” Castro wrote in the letter obtained by The Bee Friday through a public records act request. “One prominent example is the new Linda and Stewart Resnick Student Union, which will open by early 2022.”
Lamas has since relocated to Florida. He says he had hoped to teach and do some consulting. He did start a consulting firm in January 2021 called Lamas Education Advisory Services.
“Obviously, these recent reports will make it very difficult for me,” he says. “I will be explaining away this stuff for the rest of my life.”
Still, he says: “I had a good career. I’m proud of the work that was done everywhere along the way.”
This story was originally published February 6, 2022 at 5:00 AM with the headline "‘This is horrible for me.’ Former Fresno State VP Lamas speaks out on Castro, allegations."
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