By Andrea Lannom
Charleston Daily Mail
CHARLESTON, W. Va. — A federal magistrate is considering motions seeking medical records of Southern Regional Jail correctional officers accused in six lawsuits of either sexually exploiting female inmates or ignoring conduct.
Huntington attorney Michael Woelfel filed six lawsuits, which were moved to federal court, on behalf of female inmates Ashley Salisbury, Katrina Moore, Jennifer Gillum, Amanda McKinney, Samantha Huffman and Susan Boley. Most of the lawsuits targeted correctional officer William Wilson, chief correctional officer Lt. Larry Bunting and the West Virginia Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority.
These lawsuits asserted Wilson made sexual remarks to the inmates seeking sexual favors and also sexually abused them.
“Defendant Wilson has been identified as a serial violator of women’s civil rights in a dozen lawsuits,” the Salisbury lawsuit alleges. “However, Defendant Bunting continued to assign Wilson to directly supervise female offenders until he was arrested on three felony charges arising from his sexual misconduct at SRJ.”
The lawsuits accuse Bunting of ignoring conduct and concealing incident or investigative reports.
“Staff sexual harassment and sexual abuse of female offenders housed at SRJ was pervasive under Bunting’s watch,” the lawsuit alleged. “Bunting was deliberately indifferent to the substantial danger that Wilson posed to Plaintiff.”
The lawsuits also state the regional jail authority failed to provide a safe facility to inmates.
Two of the lawsuits added other correctional officers.
One, filed by Amanda McKinney, added correctional officer George Thomas and correctional officer Matthew Vandall, alleging Thomas and Wilson sexually harassed and abused her and Vandall sexually harassed her.
Another, filed by Susan Boley, named correctional officer James Prince, Bunting and the authority. This lawsuit similarly alleged Prince sexually harassed her and made sexually exploitative comments to her.
In their responses, the correctional officers and the authority denied allegations and asked for the lawsuits’ dismissal.
In Tuesday’s hearing, Woelfel sought the release of medical records, which he said could include psychological reports determining if Wilson and Bunting were fit for duty.
Woelfel said he wasn’t interested in redacted privileged medical information and only wants the evaluations because he didn’t want to get to trial and have the defense present testimony that evaluations showed they were fit for duty.
Woelfel cited a recent state Supreme Court’s decision to rehear a case from a female inmate who alleged she was raped 17 times by a correctional officer. In that case, the state Supreme Court ruled the inmate couldn’t bring the lawsuit against the West Virginia Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority because it was immune from these claims since the correctional officer wasn’t acting within the scope of his job.
Woelfel cited a footnote in that opinion, which said psychological testing is required before employment. He said if a correctional officer demonstrated a need for psychological testing, it was a duty to have that person tested.
He said the evaluation would be the “cornerstone of the trial.”
Attorneys for the jail authority said they have followed procedures and that the Legislature prohibited the regional jail from releasing medical records unless that person releases them.
Attorneys said they have provided personnel files to Woelfel already and said clients have not waived privileged information.
U.S. Magistrate Dwane Tinsley took the motion under advisement and said he would enter an order soon since time was at hand in the case. Tinsley mentioned the cases are scheduled to go through mediation the first week of July.
Woelfel said the cases are set for trial this fall before U.S. District Judge John Copenhaver.