CHARLESTON — Gov. Jim Justice, during a Monday press conference, described three areas of inquiry into the West Virginia State Police.
They involve video recordings in a state police women’s locker room several years ago, the involvement of a trooper in a theft at a casino and an active investigation over a death along Interstate 81 involving a trooper.
The Justice administration has previously alluded to an investigation of the state police, but the acknowledgement lacked specifics. Monday, the governor went farther in specifying particular lines of inquiry, although he still left much unsaid. In some cases, the governor called for even more investigation.
An investigation by the Department of Homeland Security started with an anonymous letter that made a range of allegations about monetary and sexual actions involving troopers. The administration began looking into the validity of the allegations after being asked about them by television news.
The Justice administration indicated a preliminary investigation of those matters had been concluded late last week but that the governor had not yet had time to review the results. The administration had planned public disclosure of the findings later this week, but the resignation of State Police Superintendent Jan Cahill moved up the timeline.
Justice described three areas of inquiry. Here’s what we know about each:
Video recordings
The governor described the existence of video recordings in a state police women’s locker room. He did not specify how or when the recordings were made, the extent of the recordings or the location of the recording device.
The governor did say the state employee suspected of placing the recording device died several years ago.
The anonymous letter that prompted the investigation indicated a hidden camera system was placed inside a women’s locker room at a gymnasium at the state police training facility, which is in Institute.
“I don’t know how in the world many things could be much, much worse than that,” Justice said at his Monday press conference. “You know, wouldn’t you absolutely think that a women’s locker room ought to be a safe place, an absolute safe place?
“And now we’ve got a situation to where — whether it was in 2014 or 2016, whether it was before Jan, before the governor, whatever it may be — our state police did stuff that was really bad. To put a video camera in the women’s locker room, to me it is absolutely not to be tolerated in any way.”
The governor said the situation was worsened when three troopers found a thumb drive that had stored video from the locker room.
“And then, from what I understand, one if not all immediately jerked the thumb drive out and threw it on the floor and started stomping on it,” Justice said. “You can’t make this stuff up, can you? Really and truly, now we’ve got law enforcement officers destroying evidence. You can’t make it up.”
The governor said he wants investigators to continue examining the situation with the video recordings, although he acknowledged the possibility that it would be hard to determine more specifics at this point. “Maybe there’s no way to recover evidence, but we ought to try,” he said.
Casino theft
Justice described a man playing video gaming machines at the Mardi Gras casino in Cross Lanes while a State Police trooper was nearby. The man had an envelope that fell from his possession as he walked away from the machine, the governor said.
“The trooper picked it up and took the money,” Justice said. “Basically any way you cut it, that money was stolen.”
When reporters asked about that incident recently, the administration responded that on Feb. 16, chief of staff Brian Abraham discussed the incident with Cahill and recommended that two troopers who were involved should be fired. Instead, the administration said, one trooper retired and another transferred.
Today, the governor said, “as far as us doing a quick investigation and getting right onto what we should get onto, we didn’t do that.”
Again, the governor directed the acting superintendent to examine the matter more thoroughly. “I don’t know what else we can do other than replace, not tolerate and move forward,” Justice said.
I-81 death
Finally, the governor cited the death of a man who had been involved in a struggle with a state trooper along Interstate 81, north of Martinsburg.
The state police denied access to video evidence from the fatal encounter, citing, in part, an investigation of potential crimes by law enforcement officers.
“I’ve seen the video,” Justice said Monday. “The video is very, very concerning. The investigation is ongoing at this time.”
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