EXTRA CONTENT: Woman accuses W’burg police of civil rights abuses

Read the entire text of the lawsuit by clicking here.

A Jellico woman is accusing Williamsburg police and other officials of violating her civil rights following her arrest for public intoxication in May 2008.

Through her attorneys, Kimberly J. Perkins filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in London on May 13, nearly a year after she claims she was abused at the hands of city police officers Michael Taylor and Russell Jones.

According to the lawsuit, Perkins was a guest at the Days Inn motel in Williamsburg on May 14 where she had traveled to meet a friend following a surgical procedure at the University of Tennessee Medical Center. The two shared a room and were planning on traveling to Louisville.

Perkins left the hotel to get something to eat at a nearby Krystal Restaurant when she was stopped by Taylor who apparently questioned her about a "loud and potentially violent argument" among employees at the Days Inn. She said she knew nothing about the fight and didn’t learn about it until after the fact.

The lawsuit goes on to claim that Taylor referred to her as a man, inappropriately touched her then later, with Jones, searched her room and seized some medications that had been prescribed to her, along with other items. Perkins also claims Taylor removed bandages covering wounds as deep as one and a half inches and probed them claiming she was hiding drugs, which "caused excruciating and uncontrollable pain."

Perkins says she was lodged in the Whitley County Detention Center "in a dirty cell with an unkempt man who was lying on an old mat" and was refused medications and proper treatment for her wounds. She says that some of her medication, $585 in cash, three rings and some winning lottery tickets have never been returned to her. He arrest is part of an ongoing criminal prosecution which her attorneys claim is "false and without any basis in law and fact."

The lawsuit claims Perkins’ Constitutional rights to be free from illegal search and seizure and from use of excessive force. She says she has been physically and emotionally traumatized by the incident and is seeking monetary damages.

Williamsburg Mayor Roddy Harrison, Whitley County Judge Executive Pat White, the Whitley County Detention Center and Whitley County Jailer Ken Mobley area also named as defendants in the suit.

No formal response has yet been filed.