BECKLEY – A federal lawsuit says the state’s regional jails and prisons are in desperate need of maintenance and staffing.
Beckley attorney Steve New filed a complaint earlier this month that, if successful, would require the state to do at least $270 million in maintenance that has been put off at jails, prisons and juvenile facilities across the state. It also would require the state to spent at least $60 million to fill vacancies in the system.
The complaint lists Gov. Jim Justice and new Department of Homeland Security Secretary Mark Sorsaia as defendants. The potential class action lawsuit was filed on behalf of Thomas Sheppheard, an inmate at Mount Olive Correctional Complex, Southwestern Regional Jail inmate Tyler Randall and J.P., a minor incarcerated at Donald R. Kuhn Juvenile Center in Boone County. It says there are about 10,000 inmates in the state living in inhumane conditions.
New
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“I am proud of the work our team has done these last 15 months uncovering the truth,” New told The West Virginia Record. “There remains much work to be done in order to achieve justice and effectuate change in this state’s correctional facilities.”
New said some of the details in the lawsuit are based on information provided by current and former members of the Justice administration through sworn depositions in a separate lawsuit about conditions at the Southern Regional Jail. New is representing plaintiffs in that case as well.
“(They said) that these conditions have existed for over a decade,” New told MetroNews earlier this month. “The overcrowding in particular, the understaffing issue, while it got better before the pandemic has gotten much worse.”
The complaint alleges overcrowding has caused inmates to endure “inhumane living conditions,” citing violations of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
“Despite these constitutional and statutory requirements, defendants have subjected inmates housed at all the states correctional facilities and other such facilities throughout the State of West Virginia, including plaintiffs, to inhumane living conditions, deprived them of basic human necessities, and acted with deliberate indifference towards the health and safety of inmates,” the complaint states.
New said a recent legislative special session that addressed some corrections issues wasn’t enough.
“Their people (the Justice administration) are in depositions in my case saying that 50 to 60 million dollars needs spent yet they only put a bill forth to do 25 million dollars to address staffing and nothing as it relates to the 270 million dollars to address deferred maintenance,” New told MetroNews. “This state needs to get serious about the conditions of its jails, prisons and juvenile facilities and it needs to get serious about what it wants to do with rampant staffing issues.”
The complaint says two officials – Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation Chief of Staff Brad Douglas and former DCR Commissioner Betsy Jividen – have testified that overcrowding has been “at least a decade in the making.” It also says former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeff Sandy testified understaffing has “been an issue for decades.”
It also says lawmakers have not done enough to help with pay issues that might keep some corrections officers from quitting and also haven’t done enough to maintain the facilities. It also notes the state ended the 2023 fiscal year with an surplus reported to be $1.8 billion, “shattering the all-time record for biggest single-year revenue surplus in state history for the second straight year in a row,” according to a press release from the governor’s office.
The lawsuit seeks an injunction to stop the state from housing prisoners under the current conditions, and it seeks to impose a timeframe in which the state must comply with the injunction.
The plaintiffs are being represented by New, Amanda Taylor and Emilee B.Wooldridge of New Taylor & Associates in Beckley, by Timothy Lupardus of The Lupardus Law Firm in Pineville, by Zachary Whitten of The Whitten Law Office in Pineville and by Robert Dunlap of Robert Dunlap & Associates in Beckley.
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia case number 5:23-CV-00530