Police: Rilya's caregiver changed story after test

The woman also said she hit Rilya Wilson, according to a police memo detailing

©Associated Press
December 8, 2002

MIAMI -- After being told she failed a polygraph test, one of Rilya Wilson's caregivers said she did not know exactly when the missing girl was taken from her home, a police memo revealed.

Geralyn Graham also told police she hit Rilya's legs with a "switch" hard enough to leave welts a few days before the little girl disappeared, nearly two years ago.

The memo detailing the polygraph test was part of 2,600 pages of pretrial documents that prosecutors released Friday outlining their investigation of Geralyn and Pamela Graham, who cared for the little girl. The women are charged with stealing more than $14,000 in state welfare checks before and after Rilya's disappearance.

Rilya, who would now be 6, was reported missing in April when child protection workers realized they had skipped more than a year of required monthly visits to her foster home.

Authorities arrested Geralyn Graham, her two children and her roommate Pamela Graham on a variety of fraud charges in October. No criminal charges have been filed stemming from Rilya's disappearance. The women have denied any wrongdoing and say they don't know what happened to Rilya.

Defense attorneys said they had not seen the documents and were unable to comment on specific allegations.

But Brian Tannebaum, Geralyn Graham's attorney, and Joshua Fisher, Pamela Graham's attorney, criticized prosecutors for releasing results of polygraph tests.

"What does that have to do with the fraud case?" Fisher asked.

Prosecutors will not discuss the case out of court, said Ed Griffith, a spokesman for the state attorney's office.

Geralyn Graham, who called herself Rilya's grandmother, had told authorities the girl was taken from her home by a female social worker on January 18, 2001. Department of Children and Families officials have denied that.

But according to the police memo, Geralyn Graham said she "was not sure where the woman worked or when she actually took Rilya." She then said the girl could have been taken in early February.

She also told how she had disciplined Rilya with a "switch" when the girl misbehaved.

Graham changed her story after detectives told her she showed signs of deception on a polygraph test administered by Miami-Dade police on April 30. Pamela Graham was given a test later that day, and results also suggested signs of deception.

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