By SOPHIA TAREEN (Associated Press)
CHICAGO (AP) — A lawsuit filed on Monday by 95 men and women who were housed at Illinois youth centers as children alleges that child sexual abuse was widespread and systematic for many years.
The lawsuit describes alleged incidents of abuse from 1996 to 2017, which include gang rape, forced oral sex, beatings, and groping of children by various staff members at nine youth centers. Many of the plaintiffs said they were either threatened or rewarded to keep quiet.
The 186-page complaint stated, “The State of Illinois has allowed a culture of abuse at Illinois Youth Centers to flourish unabated.”
The lawsuit, filed in the Illinois Court of Claims, follows similar disturbing accusations of child sex abuse at juvenile detention centers in Maryland, New Jersey, New Hampshire, California, and New York City. Some cases have gone to trial or resulted in settlements, with some arrests being infrequent.
made. The lawsuit contends that the state of Illinois failed to supervise, discipline, remove, or investigate alleged abusers, allowing the abuse to continue. The complaint claims that the abuse occurred at youth centers across the state, including Chicago, Joliet, Harrisburg, Murphysboro, and Warrenville. Several of these locations have since closed down.
The lawsuit names the state of Illinois, the state’s Department of Corrections and Department of Juvenile Justice as defendants. It seeks damages of about $2 million per plaintiff, the maximum allowed by law.
Messages left on Monday with the governor’s office and both corrections agencies were not immediately returned.
The 95 plaintiffs are part of a larger group of sexual abuse victims at Illinois detention centers, according to Jerome H. Block, the attorney handling the case, who anticipates filing more lawsuits. His law firm has been involved in lawsuits in Maryland, New Jersey, and New York City.
Block said, “The people who were supposed to keep our clients safe when they were children were the ones committing the sexual abuse. This is long-term institutionalized sexual abuse.”
The Associated Press doesn't typically publish the names of people who claim they were sexually assaulted unless they agree to be identified or decide to share their stories publicly.
Three of the 95 plaintiffs are named in the lawsuit, including Jeffery Christian of Maywood, who felt it was important to come forward publicly because he believed it could help others who might be suffering in silence.
The 36-year-old man from suburban Chicago stated that he was sexually abused at two different detention centers starting around the age of 13, including by a counselor who groped and fondled him during counseling sessions.
Like many of the plaintiffs, Christian said the abuse was reported at the time, but facility administrators took no action to address it. He mentioned that reporting the abuse made him more vulnerable. After the incidents, he became withdrawn and anti-social.
“It prepared me to start looking at the world different,” he said. “It took some light out of me.”
At least six workers at a detention center, including a current mayor of a small town in southern Illinois, were accused in the lawsuit of being repeat offenders with separate accusations from different plaintiffs. Some accused workers are named in the lawsuit, while others are identified only by physical attributes, initials, or nicknames as remembered by the plaintiffs. Most plaintiffs are identified by initials in the complaint.
The complaint attributes sexual abuse to the state's use of unconstitutional and systemic strip searches.
The complaint stated that the State of Illinois has known about such abuse for decades but failed to protect confined youth from sexual abuse and neglected to implement necessary policies for their protection.
The lawsuit refers to a 2013 U.S. Department of Justice survey of incarcerated youth, which found Illinois to be one of the four worst states nationwide for sexual abuse in detention facilities. It also mentions around six criminal cases from 2000 to 2021 where youth center employees were convicted of sexually abusing children and alleges that the abuse continues to this day.
Rocky James, a longtime supervisor at the Harrisburg center who currently serves as the mayor of nearby Eldorado in southern Illinois, is among the alleged repeat offenders mentioned in the lawsuit. Six plaintiffs separately claim that James abused them in the 2000s, including one teenager who was regularly coerced into having sexual intercourse inside his cell and the bathroom, according to the lawsuit.
James, who has served as mayor of the town of about 3,500 people since 2007, has not been charged with any wrongdoing. He was also a former member of the Eldorado city council and Saline County board.
When James, 59, was reached by telephone on Monday, he said it was the first time he was hearing of the allegations.
He denied the allegations, saying, "There's absolutely no truth to it," and declined further comment.
Criminal charges are still possible in some of the more recent cases, as there is no longer a statute of limitations on crimes related to the sexual abuse of minors occurring after Jan. 1, 2020. However, there remains a 20-year limit on alleged offenses committed prior to that, allowing for the possibility of criminal charges in cases allegedly occurring as long ago as 2004.
Many plaintiffs said their abusers threatened them with violence, solitary confinement, transfers to harsher facilities, and longer sentences if they reported the abuse. Others were offered rewards such as extra food, money in their commissary accounts, the chance to play video games, and other benefits to keep silent.
The plaintiffs were aged from 12 to 17 when they said they were abused, often while they were isolated in a bathroom, kitchen, or in their cells. The lawsuit stated that when detainees reported abuse, it was dismissed, with one lieutenant saying, "He's just playing around," or a chaplain telling a 17-year-old boy, whom he allegedly fondled and upset, "This is what goes on" in the church.
The plaintiffs are now adults, with the oldest in their early 40s. Most of them are men, but one of the detention centers was co-ed. They are from small communities and big cities, mostly in Illinois, and several are from Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio, Iowa, and Texas.
“Kids who are kept in juvenile detention centers are especially at risk of being sexually abused. This is because the people who work at these centers have complete control over the kids, so the kids have no way to avoid the abuse,” Block stated.
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Associated Press writer John O’
