CHARLESTON – A Kanawha Circuit Court judge has allowed the discovery portion of four civil lawsuits involving a hidden camera in the women’s locker room at the West Virginia State Police Academy to be consolidated.
During the September 28 hearing, Judge Kenneth Ballard said his decision was not meant to be restrictive. The trials, for now, haven’t been consolidated.
“I am in no way limiting anybody’s discovery with regards to the depth and breadth of who can be discovered, in what manner and what extent they could be discovered,” he said during the hearing.
Joshua Miller, who is representing one of the women who filed a lawsuit, said he’s glad Ballard made a point to say discovery won’t be limited.
I think there is a ton of discovery needed,” Miller, of Toriseva Law in Wheeling, told The West Virginia Record. “We don’t even know how many cameras were there or where the cameras were. How many devices had the videos stored on them? We don’t know any of that.”
During the hearing, attorney Jake Layne said the State Police wants to prevent having witnesses deposed numerous times because the facts of the case are the same. He also said the State Police plans to try each case separately.
In their civil lawsuits, the women claim there was a hidden video camera in the women's shower and locker facilities at the training academy and that by videotaping women in the locker room, the defendants have let down female law enforcement recruits, officers, employees and civilians.