Texas regulators shut down a home day care a month after warnings that a convicted rapist has been living there, The Dallas Morning News has learned.

Without a tip from a parent, the day care would probably still be operating. A father told The News that he discovered the address of the day care on the state sex offender registry while researching a place to care for his children.

Regulators issued the license to Earline Elizabeth Williams in April 2005 - five months after her son, a convicted rapist, left prison and listed her address as his home with the sex offender registry.

Patrick Crimmins, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, said Thursday that child-care licensing investigators asked Ms. Williams to shut down her day care because she did not submit her son, Robert Christopher Cherry, for a background check by the agency. Mr. Crimmins said the department received a complaint on Aug. 7 about Mr. Cherry living at the home.

Had Ms. Williams told regulators that Mr. Cherry lived there, she would not have been given a home day-care license because her son would not have passed the criminal background check necessary for those living in a home that operates a day care.

Mr. Crimmins said protective services hopes to make such checks automatic with a computer. But he said the department is still unsure how much it would cost and whether it's feasible. No date has been set to begin the checks.

In May, a 1-year-old girl was sexually assaulted at a Forest Hill home day care where a paroled rapist lived. The man - the husband of the owner - had recently registered as a sex offender. The man denied wrongdoing and has not been charged. That day care is now closed.

Parole officials require checking day-care registries against the sex-offender database, and they disciplined an employee in this case for not doing so. They say the employee visited the home but did not check every room for evidence of children. That is now required.

Officials with the Texas Department of Public Safety say after Mr. Cherry, now 38, was released from prison in November 2004, he told Dallas police he would be living at his mother's Pleasant Grove home. He served a 10-year sentence for rape.

In April 2005, the state's child-care licensing agency issued a home day-care license to Ms. Williams, at the same address. Ms. Williams was cleared to give 24-hour care, meaning that children could spend the night in her home.

Ms. Williams denied that her son had lived with her, even though he was legally required to live at the address he gave Dallas police. Mr. Cherry could not be reached for comment.

The state sex offender database and Dallas police still show his address as the home day care. Mr. Cherry's driver's license is also issued at that address.

The state has inspected Ms. Williams' day care once - in March 2005, according to records on the protective services Web site. An inspector found two violations. One was for not having a written procedure for handling medical emergencies. The second was for not having an emergency evacuation and relocation diagram.

A father discovered the link while searching for day-care centers in Dallas for his preschool age children. Joe Wallace said ChildCareGroup referred him to Ms. Williams' home.

He visited and said he left Ms. Williams' home with an uneasy feeling when he was checking the place out for his 3- and 4-year-old children. He searched the state's sex offender database and found Ms. Williams' address as the home of Mr. Cherry.

Susan Hoff, who heads ChildCareGroup, confirmed that Mr. Wallace contacted her agency in July to get a list of state-approved centers in his area. ChildCareGroup provides such referrals and also runs several centers itself and oversees federal subsidies of center tuition throughout Dallas County.

Ms. Hoff said her agency relies on the state's child-care licensing officials to investigate whether centers are safe. Her staff, she added, also urges parents to visit places and ask questions before doing business with them.

"This father clearly was doing what a parent should," Ms. Hoff said. "He went the extra mile. ... He discovered something that should have been discovered by licensing."

ChildCareGroup has quit referring people to Ms. Williams, she said. She said she is concerned that the state allowed the center to remain open while investigating.

Mr. Crimmins, of protective services, said the agency did not have a tally of how often a complaint is made about a sex offender living at a home day care. He said it was rare, but finding an exact number was not practical because employees would have to count them by hand. He said employees did not have time.

In the 1990s, Mr. Cherry also pleaded guilty to an aggravated assault charge and was found not guilty in another sexual assault case. The grand jury declined to indict him on a third sexual assault case.

Dallas police this week filed a failure to register as a sex offender charge against Mr. Cherry, court records show. A Dallas police spokeswoman, Sr. Cpl. Jamie Matthews, said police filed the charge because Mr. Cherry did not report to Dallas police this year for his annual check in. He also missed his 2005 appointment. Cpl. Matthews said the charge was not related to Mr. Cherry living at a day care and said police were not aware of it.

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