Lawsuit alleges Kentucky woman was put through improper strip search at jail
Staffers at the Casey County Jail made a 65-year-old woman undergo an improper strip search and one threatened to beat her when she had a panic attack, the woman has charged in a federal lawsuit.
Attorneys representing Kumsook “Kim” Oh Huff, of Liberty, filed the lawsuit in federal court earlier this month over an incident from Aug. 22, 2022.
Huff was driving her husband home that evening when a sheriff’s deputy, Aaron Schoenbachler, pulled her over because he suspected she was impaired, according to the lawsuit and a citation.
An ambulance crew had reported seeing Huff’s truck “all over the road,” and Schoenbachler saw her swerve into the wrong lane after he started following her, according to the citation.
After Schoenbachler pulled Huff’s pickup truck over, she stumbled getting out and lost her balance, was “very argumentative,” and showed signs of impairment during field sobriety tests, the deputy said in the citation.
Huff’s lawsuit says she was not impaired by drugs, medication or alcohol.
Rather, a rear tire on the truck was low, and that’s why Huff struggled to keep it in the correct lane, according to the lawsuit.
Huff had trouble with some of the sobriety tests, such as counting backwards and reciting parts of the alphabet, because she came to the U.S. as an immigrant from South Korea and didn’t learn English until later in life, the lawsuit says.
Huff also had difficulty with the test requiring her to stand on one foot because she has trouble maintaining her balance, especially under duress, the lawsuit says.
Police took Huff to the Casey County Hospital to have blood drawn and then took her to jail on a charge of driving while impaired by a controlled substance.
At the jail, a female deputy jailer told Huff she would have to undergo a strip search, the lawsuit says.
Huff had to undress in view of several deputy jailers, then was ordered to separate her buttocks and cough, bend over and cough, then squat down and expose her genitals and cough, the lawsuit alleges.
The deputy told Huff that was standard procedure.
However, the lawsuit argues a jailhouse strip search is not standard procedure and may only legally be conducted under certain circumstances, and that Huff’s case didn’t meet any of the provisions that would justify such a search.
There also are no records in Huff’s jail file documenting the grounds for the strip search, as the law requires, the lawsuit says.
Huff later had several panic attacks at the jail and had trouble breathing, according to the lawsuit.
One jail employee instructed her to breathe slowly through her nose to calm herself, but others at various times told her to shut up or that she was acting like a child, and one threatened to “come in and beat the s--t” out of her, the lawsuit charges.
At one point, deputy jailers told Huff to walk from the cell to the central counter and sit in a chair, but Huff told them she couldn’t walk in her upset state.
A male guard began to help her walk, but after another deputy told him to stop and he released Huff, she fell to the floor, the lawsuit says.
A female deputy jailer than allegedly grabbed the waistband of the pants Huff was wearing, twisting them into her crotch and using them to drag her to the chair.
Huff was arraigned and released the morning after she was arrested.
Tests completed later showed no drugs or alcohol in her system, according to the lawsuit.
The DUI charge against her was dismissed as a result.
The lawsuit is against the county, Sheriff Jerry Coffman, Jailer Mike Woodrum, the city of Liberty and the police department. Police Chief Steven Garrett, employees of the sheriff’s office, the police department and the jail are also listed as defendants.
The lawsuit alleges Huff suffered physical pain and suffering and emotional and mental anguish. It also alleges authorities violated her Constitutional rights and that the mistreatment was “motivated by Kim’s race and national origin as a Korean immigrant.”
The sheriff, jailer and police chief did not respond to a request for comment.
The complaint seeks an unspecified amount of money to compensate Huff and punish the authorities who allegedly violated her civil rights.
Louisville attorney Hans Poppe and others in his firm filed the lawsuit for Huff.
