Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton said on Thursday that investigators had found 'substance' to molestation allegations against a top police commander and were seeking to bring charges against him. Sources close to the case said the allegations stem from three men who claim that Deputy Chief David Kalish, the LAPD's highest-ranking openly gay officer, sexually molested or assaulted them during the 1970s.

Bratton said the Department investigated the charges for five months before submitting a request the D.A.'s office for filing of charges. The allegations are currently the subject of civil suit filed against Kalish, so they are not secret. Bratton said that even if the DA declines to file charges, Kalish will still face administrative charges.

Bratton said he had to place Kalish on "home assignment" because the deputy chief could not be effective with the molestation allegations swirling around him. The chief said it would be impossible to keep the matter secret. The allegations apparently surfaced in a lawsuit by a man who claimed in a civil lawsuit that Kalish "harassed, sexually molested and assaulted" him in the 1970s, when they had contact through a teen program run by the Boy Scouts of America. Since then, sources said, two more men have come forward to say that they were molested by Kalish when they were young.