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| N.H. Women Claim Rape, Sue Ex-Sgt., State |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 01/23/2006 |
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Three former female inmates of a New Hampshire halfway house filed a class action lawsuit last week against a former corrections sergeant accused of repeatedly raping them. The lawsuit against Douglas Tower, 61, of Goffstown, and the state Department of Corrections was filed in Merrimack County Superior Court on behalf of 125 former inmates of the Shea Farm halfway house. Tower also has been charged in a criminal case. The civil lawsuit does not specify damages but the lawyer for the three unidentified women said damages will be outlined later. The women claim they suffered emotional pain, humiliation, embarrassment, anguish and possible delay in being released and rehabilitated. Lawyer Richard Lehmann said the decision to file a class action suit was made "to assure the likelihood of compensation and to protect their anonymity." The lawsuit alleges that the three women were inmates at Shea Farm in 2004 and 2005 and that Tower used his authority to demand from them oral sex and intercourse without condoms. The suit says that when Tower was accused of sexual harassment with a female corrections officer at the men's prison in Concord and women's prison in Goffstown, the Corrections Department transferred him to Shea Farm and failed to supervise him. Shea Farm inmates struggle with chemical dependency and are trying to re-establish contact with their families, according to the suit. According to court records in the criminal case, Tower denied the accusations when investigators first approached him in June. He said that though the inmates at Shea Farm dressed provocatively and flirted with him, he did not have sex with them. |
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