Rilya Wilson

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Rilya Wilson was a foster child of the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF) and the centerpoint of an investigation into neglect and mismanagement in the organization.^[1] She was approximately 4 years old when she disappeared in 2000. DCF did not discover her disappearance until two years later, when she was not found living at the home of caretaker Geralyn Graham. Graham is suspected by prosecutors to have murdered Wilson, but only circumstantial evidence has been presented. Graham was later jailed for identify fraud and Medicaid fraud for accepted payments on behalf of Wilson after she was missing.^[2] The two caretakers claimed that a DCF worker had taken the child for medical testing and never returned. Authorities denied that any state worker had ever taken Wilson for medical testing.^[3]

The fiasco later prompted the resignation of the DCF chief and passage of a new law requiring tracking of efforts to find missing children and improved supervision of foster children.