NAPLES, Florida - February 2, 2010 - The mother of a 14-year-old Immokalee boy who was repeatedly assaulted by other juveniles in the Collier County Detention Center is suing the Collier Sheriff’s Office and the state Department of Juvenile Justice for not protecting her son.

The lawsuit is the first public indication the boy was sexually assaulted and injured in May 2008. The lawsuit says the boy suffered rectal trauma, severe diarrhea, and bleeding that indicated a sexual assault occurred while one of his attackers covered the video surveillance cameras.

Due to the sexual nature of the case, the names of the boy and his mother are being withheld by the Daily News. His attackers were convicted in the assault.

The state Department of Juvenile Justice issued a scathing report on the videotaped assault, which occurred between May 14 and 15, 2008, and focused most of its criticism on Deputy Shadrick McCausland, who falsified records to indicate he conducted required 10-minute checks.

McCausland later admitted to sheriff’s Professional Responsibilities Bureau investigators he lost track of time while surfing the Internet for gang Web sites while conducting gang intelligence research.

Although falsifying public records is a criminal offense, McCausland was never prosecuted. In December 2008, after an internal investigation by the sheriff’s Professional Responsibilities Bureau, McCausland, then 34, was charged with untruthfulness and suspended for a week without pay, placed on six months’ probation, and was given a letter of reprimand and a final warning.

The 5½ -year employee, who began working for the Sheriff’s Office in July 2004, was promoted to corporal on June 29 and now collects $51,648.48 annually.

Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Karie Partington said they had not been served with the lawsuit and added, “In accordance with agency policy, we’re unable to comment on pending litigation.”

DJJ Spokeswoman Samadhi Jones said her department also hadn’t been served and doesn’t comment on pending litigation.

The mother’s lawyer, however, questioned why the family was forced to sue.

“While those involved in covering up this horrific incident seem to be enjoying continued success within their departments, our client and his family still have no resolution to what happened to him,” said René Suarez, a Fort Myers attorney.

“The agencies have refused to even discuss a reasonable resolution of our complaint and have forced us to file suit; despite the fact that their culpability is obvious and beyond question.”

“Our client is a good kid who found himself in the same cell with violent offenders due to relatively minor school truancy issues,” Suarez added.

“He never should have been placed in the same cell, but once there, the Collier County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice failed miserably in their duty to supervise the children entrusted to their care. Had assigned personnel just looked at their camera screens, like they were supposed to, they could have put a stop to the assault.”

The 19-page state DJJ investigative report showed McCausland didn’t conduct the required 10-minute checks for 58 minutes, then filled out forms showing he had checked on Joshua Richard Tirado, 17, of Golden Gate, and Tyler “T-Boy” Joseph Murphy, 15, of East Naples, but the younger boy’s forms disappeared.

The 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift usually is staffed by one detention officer who also screens those entering the juvenile holding center at the Collier government complex.

However, the DJJ report said, that officer had many duties, couldn’t watch security monitors for eight straight hours, and didn’t see one boy covering one camera with a shirt for 40 seconds of the 69-minute videotaped attack.

The report said a sheriff’s investigator who watched the video determined the repeated assaults occurred between 11:37 p.m. May 14 and 12:46 a.m. May 15, when the teens slapped, kicked and pushed the 14-year-old and forced him to lick the floor after they appeared to urinate or spit on it. The report said the boy also was forced to slap himself until he bled and to wash his face in the toilet and lick the toilet seat several times.

But the report said the sheriff’s investigator couldn’t confirm all the boy’s allegations due to the poor quality of the videotapes, the camera’s angle and because the camera was covered at one point.

Juvenile Justice operates the center, but the Sheriff’s Office is under contract to oversee juvenile and staff safety, patrol the cells and watch a video monitor. The report says Juvenile Justice employee Meghan Marino, a probation officer in the screening unit, wasn’t aware she was required to report what occurred within two hours and was ordered to undergo further training.

The state report said a detention center employee, Norma Collymore, noticed the younger boy crying after defecating in his pants and he said he was forced to follow the two boys’ orders and was assaulted. Collymore sent him to the medical unit and he was taken to a hospital on May 17. He received medical treatment and crisis counseling before being released to his mother a day later.

The lawsuit alleges the DJJ and Sheriff’s Office were negligent for failing to: conduct required checks and other required tasks; placing older suspects with criminal records in a cell with the younger boy, who had none; report the older teens’ criminal histories to the DJJ as required; have an employee watch surveillance cameras.

It also alleges they allowed employees to perform other tasks when they were supposed to monitor juveniles; employees were overworked and assigned too many tasks; and they didn’t properly train personnel to ensure minors’ safety.

“As a result, ... (the boy) was forced by his cellmates to do incessant pushups while a cellmate’s foot was on his back, to lick the floor after his cellmates spit and urinated on it, to lick the toilet, to hit himself, (and) to wash his face in the toilet bowl,” the lawsuit says. “He was further kicked in the ribs and knocked to the floor and was sexually assaulted during a time period where the functioning surveillance camera was allowed to be covered by the assaulting juveniles.”

PRB Capt. Al Beatty told the Daily News a year ago that although an on-duty officer sits about 20 feet away from the holding cell, the officer cannot easily see inside it, so they were considering changes, including redesigning the booking area and possibly installing Plexiglas in the holding cell door to allow viewing.