Lawyer for Victim of Alleged Rape by Flagler Paramedic Informs County of Her Intention to Sue

A lawyer representing the victim of an alleged sexual assault as she was being transported unconscious aboard a Flagler County Fire Rescue ambulance has notified county government of her intention to sue.

Sam Masters, the Daytona Beach lawyer representing the woman, on Sept. 18 wrote County Commission Chair Andy Dance, the county administration and the fire chief of the legally required notice that precedes a lawsuit against a government agency. The county received the notice by certified mail on Friday.




The former patient’s claim, identified only by her initials in court papers, “is for damages for bodily injury and resulting pain, suffering, disability,” and other matters, including “aggravation of a previously existing condition,” and seeks unstated damages and legal costs. The notice also provides for a window of time for both sides to negotiate a settlement before a lawsuit is filed.

County Administrator Heidi Petito said the action is being handled by outside counsel.

The notice is not a surprise. James Tyler Melady, who had worked as a paramedic with Flagler County Fire Rescue since 2018, had a checkered record and was going to be fired when he resigned in June, was arrested on Sept. 12 on a charge of sexual battery–or rape–of a patient who was passed out with intoxication and was being transported by ambulance to a local hospital the night of Oct.16-17, 2021. Melady allegedly recorded the whole incident on a cell phone video, in which he “can be seen disrobing the patient” and sexually assaulting her, according to court papers.

Melady has been held at the Flagler County jail since his arrest on the first degree felony charge, which carries a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison. He also faces a third degree felony charge of video voyeurism. Last week Circuit Judge Terence Perkins granted the state’s motion to deny Melady bond, which means he will have to remain in jail until the disposition of the criminal case. He is scheduled for arraignment on Oct. 28.




The civil case, if and when it is filed, will be an entirely separate action. It was not a surprise to the county, which had begun to take defensive actions immediately after Melady’s arrest. Those include the installation of a second video camera inside the back of ambulances that will monitor what takes place there, though Petito said today it is not necessarily designed to record the footage.

The county is also changing its protocols for when two paramedics must be in the back of an ambulance. Until recently, only one paramedic rode with a patient who was not in need of critical care, as with patients experiencing cardiac episodes, for example. The protocol now requires that two paramedics be with the patient when the patient’s condition is “altered or vulnerable,” in Petito’s words.

The county’s fire service hired Melady in June 2018. He did not have a stellar record. There’d been issues even before last spring, when he failed a random drug test, precipitating his forced exit. “We were moving towards termination,” Petito said, because he had medication in his system for a prescription that had expired. He had been given the opportunity to have the prescription renewed. He chose to resign.




He had been disciplined with a written reprimand in 2019 for neglecting to properly maintain one of the department’s rescue units (it had run low on motor oil), which had to be pulled out of service temporarily, according to documents in Melady’s personnel file. Several emails indicate that he was also subsequently late on completing emergency reports. He had to be repeatedly reminded to do so–there were at least nine such reminders in 2022–until he was reprimanded in writing, and issued a directive for corrective action. He was also assigned administrative duties temporarily.

In July 2023, Percy Sayles, the deputy fire chief, warned Melady that he was facing termination if he did not shape up. “I am gravely concerned with your inability to follow the directives of your supervisors. You have an established an unacceptable pattern of not completing your patient care reports and on-line training, even after receiving a Corrective Action Form from Lieutenant Jon Moscowitz and a call from me,” the deputy fire chief wrote Melady in a formal warning. “I am not confident your behavior will change.” His appointment as Field Training Officer was rescinded. That was a demotion, with a cut in pay. He was suspended without pay for 12 hours on July 13, 2023. He was given stepped-up surveillance from supervisors.

Sayles in January pressed a supervisor for an update on Melady’s “performance and recommendations for his status moving forward.”

“Melady is what I would consider an adequate worker,” Lt. Armando Castaneda wrote Sayles on Jan. 12. “He is not going to seek out multiple tasks to perform very often without direction but does a great job when assigned to anything task related as well as instructionally. Melady is very competent, works hard when assigned to anything, is very affable in relation to crew interaction, has great bedside manner on calls, and appears to embrace giving any sort of instruction to others. He definitely gravitates more towards the EMS component, and I do believe he is more comfortable there because he is very proficient but also because he has a little more autonomy. When we have student riders, he seems to enjoy actively training and reviewing with them what they have been working on in medic school.”




Castenada’s reference to “autonomy” in emergency medical service calls will likely catch the attention of the alleged victim’s lawyer.

“I am not sure if he will ever be the kind of employee that actively seeks out work, but I also believe he is very good at his job and has value to contribute to this agency,” Castenada concluded.

So by the time he failed a drug test, Melady had already tested his supervisors’ patience. When he resigned, he failed to return county property, including firefighter gear such as clothing, boots and a badge, totaling $580 in value. The county deducted the amount from his last paycheck. He did not take part in an exit interview.

On June 24, Melady wrote inn email to Sayles and two supervisors his thanks for his years at Fire Rescue. “Although these are not easy decisions to make, I believe it is the best thing for me at this time,” he told them of his decision to resign. “I hope my friends are taken care of in the best way possible.”

Melady had been a Navy corpsman from 2005 to 2015 with postings in hospitals in Jacksonville and in Hawaii. He had two deployments in Afghanistan–in 2010 and 2012.