Inmate sues Budd, others in beating case

Tawhon Easterly's suit asks for more than $900,000 in damages.
By ED RUNYAN
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- The 26-year-old former Mahoning County jail inmate at the center of the trial putting Sheriff's Maj. Michael Budd and seven other law enforcement officers in prison is suing Budd, the department, county commissioners and the officers.
Tawhon Easterly, whose address is Trumbull Correctional Institute, filed the lawsuit Tuesday in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court. He asks for more than $900,000 in compensation.
The suit also names as defendants Sheriff Randall Wellington and former jail officers Sgt. William E. DeLuca, Cpl. Ronald Denson and deputies John Rivera, Raymond Hull III, Ronald Kaschak and Mark Dixon, of Youngstown. It also names Deputy Christine Kachaylo of Hubbard and former deputy Ryan Strange of Vienna.
What Easterly alleges
The suit says Easterly was being held at the jail as a pretrial detainee when on Dec. 28, 2001, he was beaten by jail employees after being identified as having struck Kachaylo earlier in the day while she was attempting to quell a disturbance among inmates in the jail's gymnasium.
It says Hull, Dixon and Strange removed Easterly from his cell that day and took him to an isolated area where Denson, Hull, Dixon, Strange and Kachaylo restrained him while Hull, Dixon and Strange beat him.
Denson and Kachaylo watched and failed to intervene, it states.
Budd later passed orders through DeLuca and Denson that Easterly was to be beaten again and "put in the hospital" as punishment for hitting a female guard, the suit contends. Hull, Dixon, Rivera and Kaschak took Easterly to an isolated area, where he was beaten by the four, it claims.
Hull and Rivera dragged Easterly naked to an isolation cell, and DeLuca instructed deputies not to file Use of Force Reports, the suit states.
Wellington learned about the beating from the Austintown Police Department, to whom Kaschak had disclosed the events while applying for a job with the department, the suit continues. Budd directed Kaschak to provide a false statement regarding the events, which Kaschak did, it states.
Further, it says Wellington learned that Kachaylo was contacted by the FBI regarding the events and "attempted to interfere" with the investigation by ordering her to write a report disclosing what she was asked by the FBI and state that she had been harassed by the FBI.
The defendants' acts (minus the commissioners) deprived Easterly of First, Fourth, Eighth and 14th Amendment rights and caused permanent injuries, the suit claims. County commissioners are legally responsible for the acts of the other defendants, it concludes.
What's being sought
The suit asks for compensatory damages of $300,000 from the defendants, plus punitive damages and costs. It asks for actual damages to be tripled.
Easterly is serving six years in state prison for involuntary manslaughter and three years for a gun specification. He began serving his sentence in 2002.
Budd, 44, of Boardman, was convicted in April in federal court of violating the civil rights of three jail inmates -- one of them Easterly -- and obstructing justice. He is serving an eight-year prison sentence.
Others convicted in the events were Strange, sentenced to 21 months; DeLuca, 16 months; Denson, 18 months; Rivera, 18 months; Hull, 15 months; and Dixon, 22 months. Kaschak was given probation.
Wellington did not return messages left Tuesday afternoon seeking comment.
The lawsuit is assigned to Judge Andrew Logan.