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Leaders never told of jail issues

County commissioners want to know why they were not immediately notified when allegations appeared in 2004.

By ABBIE VANSICKLE
Published March 21, 2006

INVERNESS - County commissioners said they weren't notified when allegations of inmate abuse at the Citrus County jail surfaced in 2004.

Now they want to know why.

"I definitely would have liked to have known about it, only because I'm responsible back to the citizens," County Commission Chairman Gary Bartell said. "When the issue did come up, I would have liked to have known there was an ongoing investigation."

Bartell was not the only commissioner concerned about why the board wasn't notified of the allegations. In a memo Wednesday to County Administrator Richard Wesch, Commissioner Vicki Phillips requested answers to the who, how and when of the situation.

"If the county was notified in December 2004, why was this information not relayed to me and the other commissioners?" Phillips said. "Or was it relayed to other commissioners?"

The commissioners' concerns came more than a week after four inmates filed a federal lawsuit against Corrections Corporation of America, a private contractor that runs the county jail.

Javon Walker, Jeffrey Young, Larry Robbins and Greg Platt alleged that at least two corrections officers urinated and defecated in their food and drink several times in late 2004. Three former employees at the Citrus jail - corrections officers Kevin Hessler and Alexander Diaz as well as a supervisor, Charles Mulligan - were fired in connection with the drink accusations.

A company spokesman met with reporters and county officials last week, saying that if any incident occurred, it was not indicative of a larger problem at the facility.

Representatives from the FBI, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the State Attorney's Office and the Citrus County Sheriff's Office were set to meet this afternoon at the sheriff's headquarters in Inverness, said sheriff's spokeswoman Gail Tierney. Tierney said the officials will meet to determine whether to investigate and which agency would handle it.

Corrections Corporation of America has said that it told the county about the allegations. On Monday, spokesman Steve Owen said the company told public safety director Charles Poliseno about the accusations.

Poliseno didn't return a message left at his office, but county spokeswoman Jessica Lambert confirmed that Poliseno was notified of the alleged incident in December 2004.

"He was notified an incident had occurred, an investigation was taking place and personnel action would be taken," she said.

The county is searching for documents from that time to see how and when that notification took place. Poliseno remembered speaking with someone from the jail about the allegations, Lambert said, but he wasn't sure if he ever had anything in writing.

Typically, if a public safety director has information for the commissioners, it first goes through the county administrator, Lambert said. The county administrator did not return a message left at his office, but an office representative said Wesch planned to release a memo on the subject today.

Whatever happened in 2004, Bartell said he wished that he would have known about the accusations before the lawsuit was filed. When accusations of problems at the Hernando County Jail - which is also run by Corrections Corporation of America - came to light recently, Bartell sent a memo to Wesch, trying to ensure that the Citrus jail didn't have any problems. The memo was passed on to the company, Bartell said.

"CCA wrote a letter back assuring there were no problems out here at the Citrus County facility," he said.

Bartell said he was later told that the commissioners weren't notified because county staffers thought the problem was resolved.

"I really don't know all the circumstances yet, but it's very obvious that it wasn't over," Bartell said. "I know they're strictly allegations, but it's obvious that there's a problem that spread wider than just those guards and the inmates ... the proper way to have handled it was to have notified us."

[Last modified March 21, 2006, 02:30:40]