Fla. panel blasts failures in missing girl case

Rilya Wilson was missing for more than year before the state realized her disappearance.

MIAMI, Florida (CNN) -- A commission reviewing Florida's child welfare system after it lost track of a 5-year-old girl has delivered a long list of proposed changes and criticized state lawmakers for underfunding the agency.

The four-member panel, led by former Miami Herald publisher David Lawrence Jr., prepared a stinging report on the Florida Department of Children and Families for Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. Bush is to formally receive the report Tuesday in Miami.

The department revealed in April that Rilya Wilson had not been accounted for in 15 months.

"The department could not answer to our satisfaction: How do you really know what is happening in the field, and how do you know when it happens?" the panel wrote. "Many of our recommendations speak directly to areas of quality assurance."

The panel recommended more than 45 changes, including 20 to be implemented or begun within three months.

The changes include conducting criminal background checks of all caregivers, including relatives; fingerprinting and photographing every child four times a year; and appropriating more money for the state agency.

The panel criticized Rilya's former caseworker, Deborah Muskelly, and her supervisor, Willie Harris, for failing to check on the girl and her sister on a monthly basis, as state law requires.

EXTRA INFORMATION The many faces of Geralyn Graham  Gallery: Rilya, the forgotten child    RESOURCES • Report: Florida's Governor's Blue Ribbon Panel on Child Protection  • Florida Department of Law Enforcement offers reward  • Transcript: CNN's Susan Candiotti interviews Geralyn Graham

Muskelly quit the department after being accused of falsifying reports of visits to children she was assigned to oversee.

"You clearly have a caseworker who didn't do her job," Lawrence told CNN. "You have a supervisor who didn't do his job."

The commission did not call for the resignations of DCF Secretary Kathleen Kearney or Charles Auslander, the head of the department's Miami district, saying there was "no constructive purpose in changing DCF's leadership at this juncture."

Those calling for Kearney's resignation include former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno, a Democratic candidate to challenge Bush in November's gubernatorial race.

The commission called Rilya's disappearance "a matter of human failure which, of course, cannot be excused."

It also found that the state Legislature "does not give -- and never has given -- DCF the resources needed to cope with the enormous burdens it faces."

"In noting this report's findings, we by no means intend to downplay, much less to whitewash, DCF's shortcomings. They are manifest, especially in the Rilya Wilson case," the report concluded.

But it added, "DCF is underfunded, understaffed, underappreciated and overworked. So it ever has been. So it remains."

The group also raised questions about Geralyn Graham, Rilya's caretaker. Initially reported to be Rilya's grandmother, commissioners said it was not clear whether she is related to the girl.

Rilya's mother, Gloria Wilson, lost custody of her daughter because of a drug problem. Graham said a DCF representative took Rilya from her home in January 2001 for testing and said she has not seen her since.

Graham applied four times for food stamps and welfare benefits as recently as March, 14 months after the child disappeared. Earlier this month, Graham said Rilya's caseworker told her to keep collecting government checks because "it would be so hard to get her back on."

CNN has documented at least 33 aliases Graham used. She was convicted of food stamp fraud in Tennessee and served a prison sentence in the 1980s, the commission found, and served five years' probation on a grand theft charge in Florida. In addition, a psychiatric evaluation found that Graham suffers from dementia.

In Florida, 16 blue-ribbon panels have met in the past 17 years after a child welfare scandal. While numerous recommendations have been made and many implemented, the scandals keep coming.

"The question is, 'Can it happen again?' In my estimation, barring some significant checks, it can happen again," Lawrence said.

-- CNN National Correspondent Susan Candiotti contributed to this report.