Grady Judd Lawsuit Over Child Rape Case Moves to Trial

Taylor Cadle’s lawsuit against Sheriff Grady Judd is a federal civil rights case accusing the Polk County Sheriff’s Office of charging her with filing a false police report when, as a twelve-year-old in 2016, she reported that her adoptive father was sexually abusing her. Filed October 10, 2025 in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, the suit names Judd, Detective Melissa Turnage, Lieutenant William Rushing, and her adoptive father Henry Cadle. In April 2026 a federal judge rejected the defendants’ motion to dismiss on most counts, and trial is scheduled for April 2027.¹²

What Happened in 2016

Taylor was twelve when she walked into the Polk County Sheriff’s Office and reported that her adoptive father, Henry Cadle, had been sexually abusing her for years. The case went to Detective Melissa Turnage of the Special Victims Unit. According to reporting by Mother Jones and the Center for Investigative Reporting, Turnage doubted Taylor from the start, suggesting the girl had “made up these allegations” because her parents had taken away her phone.³

During interviews, Turnage pressed Taylor on what would happen if her father went to jail, listing consequences like the loss of his business, her mother’s car, and the possibility she would be sent back to foster care. An expert who later reviewed the recordings described them as “interrogations by a biased detective” attempting to “pressure the child to recant.”³

The investigation of Henry Cadle lasted roughly twenty minutes. When he acknowledged having sexual thoughts about his adoptive daughter, Turnage dismissed the admission as “daydreaming.” She requested surveillance footage from a gas station where Henry allegedly bought condoms but asked for the wrong time frame, then concluded no corroborating evidence existed. She did not request a forensic examination of the suspect or have Taylor identify the specific location of the abuse. Turnage concluded the claims were false and filed an affidavit charging the twelve-year-old with a first-degree misdemeanor for giving false information to a law enforcement officer.³

Under pressure from her adoptive mother, Taylor recanted in a February 2017 meeting with her parents and a probation officer, saying she had lied because she was angry about losing her phone.⁴ The state offered a deal: plead guilty, complete probation, and the charge would be dismissed. In May 2017 she signed a document waiving her right to an attorney and pleaded guilty before Judge Mark Hofstad. The sentence included fifteen hours of community service, a 7 p.m. curfew, travel restrictions, and two apology letters. One went to an unnamed law enforcement officer. The other went to Henry Cadle. Taylor’s letter to him read, in part: “Dear dad, im sorry for what i did. I didn’t stop and think of my consequences of these actions.”³

How the Abuse Was Proven

Roughly a month after writing those letters, Taylor was sexually assaulted again by Henry Cadle.⁵ In July 2017, during one of these assaults, she used her phone to document what was happening. She captured photographs of a condom box and a six-second video that recorded the time, Henry’s location, and the condoms on the dashboard of his truck. She noted physical evidence including discarded condoms and tissues. Then she called 911.⁴

Henry Cadle was arrested. On February 15, 2019, he was convicted of sexual battery of a child. He is currently classified as a sexual predator and is incarcerated in the Florida Department of Corrections.⁶ Mother Jones reported he was sentenced to seventeen years.⁷ The Polk County State Attorney’s Office moved to vacate Taylor’s sentence and dismiss the false reporting charge.⁵

What the Lawsuit Claims

Taylor filed Cadle v. Judd (Case No. 8:25-cv-02790-KKM-SPF) at age twenty-two. The complaint asserts violations of her Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and brings claims for malicious prosecution, substantive due process violations, and failure to train and supervise officers. Against Henry Cadle, the suit brings state-law claims of sexual battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and invasion of privacy.⁸

The suit alleges the sheriff’s office maintained a “culture that prioritized disbelief of victims, particularly minors, over proper investigation” and failed to adequately train detectives in the Special Victims Unit.⁸ Taylor is represented by Laffey Bucci D’Andrea Reich & Ryan and co-counsel Rafferty Domnick Cunningham & Yaffa, and she seeks compensatory, special, and punitive damages, along with attorney’s fees.⁹

The Ruling That Let the Case Proceed

Attorneys for the sheriff’s office moved to dismiss, arguing in part that Florida’s seven-year statute of repose barred the claims because the underlying events occurred in 2016 and 2017 and the suit was not filed until 2025.

On April 15, 2026, U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle rejected that argument. She ruled the Florida statutory provision does not apply to federal civil rights claims, and she found the statute of limitations had been paused while Taylor was a minor living under the care of a guardian whose interests were directly opposed to her own. The October 2025 filing was therefore timely.¹⁰²

Judge Mizelle allowed claims of malicious prosecution and constitutional violations to proceed against Turnage, Rushing, and the Polk County Sheriff’s Office. Claims against Judd in his official capacity also survived. Claims against Judd in his personal capacity were dismissed on qualified immunity grounds, but that dismissal was without prejudice, leaving room for Taylor’s attorneys to refile with additional factual support.¹⁰

Taylor’s lead attorney, Brenda Harkavy, said the statute-of-limitations ruling could reach beyond this case, providing “an extended timeline for other survivors to file suits if they were abused as children and continued to live under the care of someone whose interests were averse to theirs.”¹⁰ Trial is scheduled for April 2027.²

The Sheriff’s Office Response

The Polk County Sheriff’s Office has called the lawsuit “frivolous” and “baseless.” Its official statement said: “Our deputies did an extensive investigation and made deliberate and rational decisions based upon the information and evidence we had at the time. We look forward to vigorously defending against these baseless and fabricated allegations in court.”¹¹

Both Turnage and Rushing remain employed by the sheriff’s office. A spokesperson described them as “outstanding deputy sheriffs” who “continue to honorably put their lives on the line to protect the citizens of Polk County.”¹² Turnage, whose disciplinary history includes a suspension for failing to read a suspect Miranda rights and a reprimand for arresting the wrong person, was required to complete a weeklong online course on interrogation techniques after investigative reporting on the case. The sheriff’s office has never publicly acknowledged the case or apologized for how the initial investigation was handled.⁷

Polk County’s Record of Charging Minors

The complaint’s culture-and-training allegations rest on a pattern documented by outside reporting. A Reveal analysis of Florida Department of Juvenile Justice data found that between 2019 and 2023, children in Polk County were charged with misdemeanor obstruction of justice, an umbrella offense that includes false reporting, at a rate of roughly 21 per 100,000 juveniles per year. The statewide rate was 10 per 100,000. During that period, Polk County charged more children with the offense than any other county in Florida.¹³

The sheriff’s office has defended the practice, describing such charges as a way to “help re-enforce the lesson” when officers believe a child has wasted police resources. In 2016, the same year as Taylor’s case, the office publicly announced on Facebook that it had charged an eleven-year-old girl with filing a false police report about an attempted abduction.⁴

After the Cadle case became public, the State Attorney’s Office for Florida’s 10th Judicial Circuit, led by Brian Haas, created a policy requiring administrative consultation before any minor claiming to be a sexual abuse victim can be charged with a crime. A spokesperson said the office has since filed three cases involving similar situations, each supported by what the office described as “irrefutable evidence proving the falsehood.”¹³

1
CaseMine. Cadle v. Judd
2
GlobeNewsWire. Federal Court Rejects Dismissal Effort in Landmark Civil Rights Case
3
Mother Jones. Taylor Cadle Polk County False Reporting Investigation
4
Reveal News. Taylor Cadle Polk County False Reporting
5
The Ledger. Polk Detective Receives Training Order Over Girls 2016 Rape Claim
6
Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Henry Paris Cadle Offender Flyer
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Mother Jones. Taylor Cadle Grady Judd Polk County Sheriff Florida Rape
8
PR Newswire. Taylor Cadle Lawsuit Press Release
9
KATV. Woman Allegedly Made to Write Apology to Rapist Files Lawsuit Against Polk County Sheriffs Office
10
Mother Jones. Survivors Lawsuit Against Florida Sheriff Moves Forward
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ClickOrlando. A Child Rape Victim Was Wrongfully Accused of Lying Now Shes Suing This Central Florida Sheriff
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WFLA. Polk County Sheriff Detectives Sued Over Child Rape Investigation
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WUSF. High Profile Polk Case Resulted in a Policy Change for Local Prosecutors