Five months after prosecutors dismissed charges that she raped her own sons, a South Florida mother is suing the detective who spearheaded her arrest.
Walquiria Cassini says Palm Beach County Detective Amy Hoffman hid proof of her innocence and lied under oath to keep her and her suspected accomplices behind bars, unwilling to rescind allegations that had, by then, become the subject of international headlines.
“What Defendant Hoffman could not make fit, she omitted. What she could not omit, she distorted. What she could not distort, she buried,” the lawsuit said.
The 32-page complaint also accuses Sheriff Ric Bradshaw of turning a blind eye as Hoffman hid exculpatory evidence from prosecutors and ducked attempts to depose her ahead of trial.
A spokesperson for the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on either Bradshaw or Hoffman’s behalf. The Palm Beach County Police Benevolent Association, which represents officers facing civil and criminal liability, also did not respond.
Hoffman has worked at PBSO since 2016. She remains the subject of an internal investigation launched in late October, when state prosecutors dropped all charges against Cassini.
They did so two weeks before her trial, saying they could no longer proceed in good faith after a review of new information.
“Make no mistake,” wrote Cassini’s attorneys, Mac Kenzie Sacks and Matthew Goldberger. “The information was only new to the State Attorney’s Office because it had been withheld by the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.”
‘What she could not distort, she buried’
The allegations against Cassini emerged amid a custody dispute between her and the father of two of her sons. The Palm Beach Post is not naming the father in order to protect the identity of his children.
Cassini reported her ex for parental kidnapping after he failed to return their boys after a Thanksgiving visit in 2023. Her ex then reported Cassini, her boyfriend Ryan Londono and her eldest son Matthew — the children’s half-brother — for sexually abusing their sons.
The boys, 7 and 14, affirmed their father’s story in interviews with police.
“It’s possible the kids are just lying about this because they want to stay with Dad,” said one of the first deputies called to investigate the claim, his words recorded on his body-worn camera.
Hoffman, who soon took over as the lead detective, didn’t appear to share his concerns.
She worked with federal investigators to investigate Cassini for months, combing through her online history and transactions. Cassini’s attorneys say that after failing to produce a single piece of corroborating evidence, Hoffman swore to arrest affidavits that were “rife with material misrepresentations and omissions.”
Among the most significant was Hoffman’s claim that Londono deleted 33 videos from a pornographic website the day after her investigation began. FBI subpoena returns, which Hoffman had in hand before the arrests, had already traced the IP address associated with the dozens of deleted videos to a man in Zephyrhills, Florida with no connection to Cassini.
The attorneys say Hoffman also misrepresented the significance of Cassini’s financial transactions on platforms like Venmo and Zelle — payments Hoffman said were related to child pornography but were actually linked to Cassini’s hair appointments and dinners with friends — to paint a picture of “sexual deviants living in suburbia.”
Hoffman omitted key information from the reports, including all mentions of the custody dispute that preceded the allegation and the boys’ refusal to undergo physical examinations. She also did not mention the cellphone extraction she received three days before the arrests that indicated the boys were manipulated and coached by their father.
According to the lawsuit, Hoffman withheld 31 pages of supplemental investigative reports from both prosecutors and defense attorneys — including documentation of the absent digital evidence and DNA results — until eight days before charges were dropped.
She allegedly lost or destroyed an audio recording of a post-arrest interview with Cassini and wrote that Cassini refused a polygraph examination when, according to the suit, audio evidence shows the examiner was the one who declined to proceed on account of Cassini’s emotional state.
As trial approached, Hoffman resisted three deposition attempts, citing illness each time. When she finally appeared, she answered nearly every question with “I do not recall.” She was reportedly sick again the day prosecutors dismissed the case.
Cassini’s attorneys call the case a study in confirmation bias. They theorized that the sensational allegations and public attention made it difficult for Hoffman, once confronted with conflicting evidence, to acknowledge she had made a mistake.
Boca family wants acknowledgment their rights were violated
Cassini and Londono were held in the Palm Beach County Jail for 135 days. Matthew Cassini, who was 20 at the time of his arrest, was jailed for 178 days.
All three were subsequently placed on house arrest with GPS ankle monitors for months, barred from the internet and prohibited from contact with one another. Both Walquiria Cassini and Londono lost their jobs.
The three are seeking compensatory damages for their time jailed and under house arrest, lost wages, reputational harm and ongoing emotional distress — including Cassini’s continued separation from her younger sons, who remain in Ocala with their father.
They are also seeking punitive damages against Hoffman and a declaratory judgment that their constitutional rights were violated. The suit does not specify a dollar amount.
Hannah Phillips is a journalist covering public safety and criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. Reach her at hphillips@pbpost.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Florida detective accused of fabricating evidence in child abuse case
Reporting by Hannah Phillips, Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post
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