Landau promised her a salary of $1,100 a week, she said, and when she quit owed her $3,300 he couldn’t pay. At one point, Landau texted her his father’s Ohio home phone number, she said, but she ended up recovering most of the money from a different relative.

Landau’s other administrative assistant, who worked for him the entire time he was in Tucson, said Landau bounced “nine or 10” of her $680-a-week paychecks during that time, leaving her credit rating in ruins. She said his father covered her final paycheck.

The 21-year-old from San Diego asked not to be identified in this story for fear of jeopardizing future employment. Her status as one of Landau’s employees is known to the Star because Landau previously referred reporters to her when she still worked for him.

The woman said she once tallied the donations in Landau’s Tucson database to try to figure out why he was having so much trouble paying her. She said the total she came up with was “around $150,000” but added she doesn’t know for sure if every database entry was recorded accurately.

Lin Leclair Turner, a longstanding member of Tucson’s foster-care community, was shocked to hear from a reporter how much money Landau’s employees said he raised here.