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CNN Live Today

Florida Police Look into Past of Caregiver

Aired May 15, 2002 - 10:18   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: In Florida, the mystery deepens in the case of missing five-year-old Rilya Wilson. Police though say that they have no leads. State welfare officials concedes they have few records, but one thing everyone does seem to have is questions about the caregiver and about her shadowy past in this case.

Our national correspondent Susan Candiotti tells us why.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Geralyn Graham appears to be the last person who saw five-year-old Rilya Wilson before turning her over to a child welfare worker more than a year ago.

GERALYN GRAHAM, RILYA'S CARETAKER: She's not dead. She's not dead.

CANDIOTTI: But how much did Florida know about Geralyn Graham's background and mental and physical ability to serve as one of two caretakers of Rilya in a foster home? Graham's sister, Pamela, has legal custody, but Graham describes herself as a stay-home grandmother in charge of Rilya and her sister, Rodericka, another foster child.

GRAHAM: I did not lie to them.

CANDIOTTI (on camera): Did they ask if you were...

GRAHAM: They told me...

CANDIOTTI: ... arrested for anything?

GRAHAM: Yes. They told me as long as I had not been arrested for anything violent or child molestation that I could be the caretaker for the children.

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): In addition to previously reported arrests, including food stamp fraud, CNN has documented through police and court records at least 33 aliases for Graham, various birth dates and different social security numbers. On arrest forms, Graham claims birthplaces in Florida, Mississippi and the Bahamas.

In a still unresolved 1996 lawsuit she filed against Alamo Rent- a-Car after an accident, defense attorneys questioned Graham's injuries. The company claimed Graham had at least two driver licenses, including two issued the same day under different names, using different photos, one with glasses, one without.

GRAHAM: I am not crazy. I just don't remember a lot of things.

CANDIOTTI: Three years ago in this videotaped deposition, Graham is asked about memory problems she claims were caused by the accident involving the Alamo vehicle.

GRAHAM: Sometimes I get lost, and I kind of close my eyes and remember.

CANDIOTTI: Graham's lawyer submitted this doctor's evaluation listing dementia, among other ailments, adding quote -- "This patient is clearly in need of psychiatric management."

Graham's attorneys also prepared this videotape of her in 1999. She appears in pain, barely able to move, helped by her sister. And just last October, Graham's sister, Pamela, was still reporting Geralyn Graham's medical troubles in this letter, prepared by a lawyer in a tenant-landlord dispute, quote -- "I am the legal guardian of my sister," Pamela writes, "because she suffers from dementia." This, nine months after Florida child welfare workers last documented a visit with Rilya.

(on camera): How much did Florida's Department of Children and Families know about Geralyn Graham's past? The agency says its check of state crime computers came up clean based on the social security number Graham gave them. DCF also says it knew nothing about the Alamo lawsuit, nothing about claims of dementia.

(voice-over): Graham's current lawyer says his client admits memory problems to this day, but insists she is clear about what happened to Rilya.

GRAHAM: There was a DCF worker who left my house with her.

CANDIOTTI: Geralyn Graham is not considered a suspect. However, police say she showed deception in a polygraph she volunteered to take. And police add, no one they are talking to, including state employees, seems to be telling the whole truth.

Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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