Kidnapped Patchogue teen’s dad sues county, state over abuse in state care

Frank Gervasi scrambled for nearly a month fighting to find his missing teenage daughter. Now, he’s suing Suffolk County and state officials who he says failed to protect her once she was found.

The Patchogue father has filed a federal lawsuit alleging his daughter was sexually assaulted by government workers at two facilities where she had been placed to keep her safe.

Gervasi, 50, filed the complaint Friday in New York’s Eastern District Court in Central Islip, according to Newsday, which first reported the lawsuit on Monday.

Gervasi, who owns a car detailing business and also has two sons, seeks more than $10 million in damages for physical and emotional harm suffered by himself and his daughter, now 16. Greater Long Island is not naming the girl because she is a minor and the victim of alleged and convicted sex crimes.

The lawsuit centers on what happened after Gervasi — who located his daughter on Jan. 3, 2025, aboard a 56-foot yacht at Whitecap Marina in Islip 25 days after she left her father’s Patchogue home — sought help from the county and state to keep her safe.

Two days after she was found, a Suffolk Family Court judge remanded the girl to Sagamore Children’s Psychiatric Center in Dix Hills. Newsday’s report indicated she was later transferred to the Brentwood Residential Center for Girls.

An employee at each facility has since been criminally charged in connection with their interactions with the girl. The lawsuit alleges a third state worker — who has not been criminally charged — also assaulted her at the Brentwood facility, Newsday reported.

“The father was encouraged and reassured by the County of Suffolk and the Court that this was safe and in [his daughter’s] best interest to be placed in a facility operated by the State of New York,” Gervasi’s attorney, Christopher Ross of Patchogue, wrote in the complaint, according to Newsday.

Reached by Greater Long Island, Michael Martino, a spokesperson for Suffolk County, declined to comment on the lawsuit.

The New York State Office of Family and Children Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Newsday, the outlet reported.

Suffolk County Police arrested Deshaun McClean, 42, of Deer Park — a mental health therapist aide at Sagamore — on charges of child sex abuse and endangering the welfare of a child. He’s accused of touching the girl inappropriately and engaging in other sexual conduct with her on multiple occasions between Jan. 9 and Jan. 28.

Gervasi’s lawsuit alleges Sagamore officials reported the inappropriate contact to him but the abuse continued.

A second state employee, Darryl Joyner, 57, of the Bronx, was later accused of offering the girl drugs in exchange for seeing her nude during her stay at Brentwood, Newsday reported. Both McClean and Joyner are named as defendants and are free on cash bail, with court dates scheduled later this month.

The girl’s disappearance began Dec. 9, 2024, when she left her father’s East Patchogue home with one of more than a dozen defendants charged with crimes committed against the teen.

The case drew national headlines as Gervasi publicly pressed for action, and took matters into his own hands, leading searches for his daughter, posting video updates on the investigation during which he spoke directly to his daughter, and tracking various leads.

Gervasi used Facebook and Instagram to press for leads throughout his daughter’s disappearance. Shortly after her rescue, he appeared on “Dr. Phil Primetime” to recount the harrowing details — including a 3 a.m. phone call in which a girl’s voice said “I love you” before hanging up, which his daughter later confirmed was the only call she had been allowed to make.

Gervasi told Dr. Phil he received an anonymous tip from a woman who was with his daughter aboard the yacht and verified the child’s identity by describing her tattoos.

He drove 20 minutes to Whitecap Marina in Islip and broke through the door of the 56-foot yacht known as The Phoenix, and found his daughter emerging from behind a curtain, he said on the Dr. Phil program.

“I didn’t want to take a chance of, God forbid, the police had to get some kind of warrant and the guy having to hide my daughter,” he said of not waiting for the police to arrive at the yacht.

Suffolk prosecutors have alleged she was repeatedly raped by adult men during the time she was missing, moving through locations in Bellport, Bohemia and Islip before ending up on a yacht owned by Francis Buckheit, 64, of East Islip, docked at Whitecap Marina.

Cases against 10 of the defendants accused in her disappearance remain active.

Most recently, Bay Shore man Daniel Soto, 37 — already held on sexual assault charges related to the Patchogue case — was indicted on separate sex trafficking charges involving a different victim.

_{Top: Frank Gervasi (Instagram/Frank Gervasi)}

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