CHARLESTON, WV (WOWK) — A United States Magistrate Judge issue a strongly worded order regarding West Virginia Department of Corrections’ handling of evidence of grievances of prisoners at the Southern Regional Jail.

After hearing testimony earlier this month magistrate Judge Omar Aboulhosn found that WVDCR failed to preserve that evidence and regulations were not followed. 

In the document Magistrate Aboulhosn writes that the failure to preserve the evidence that was destroyed in this case was intentionally done and not an oversight by department employees. The judge then sent the case to the United States Attorney’s office to decide whether the feds should investigate the state’s corrections system.

He goes on to say that “The intentional decisions to not preserve evidence, and to allow evidence to be destroyed was not done by low-level employees of the WVDCR but was perpetrated by the highest persons in the chain of command…”

13 News reached out to the Justice administration late Monday night for comment.

You can read the 39 page document here: