High-level corrections officials may be sued for their own alleged failures to prevent or respond to an employee’s sexual misconduct toward a detainee, a federal judge decided last month.

Rajae Bouhamidi was incarcerated at the Denver Women’s Correctional Facility. In late 2022, corrections officer Justin Torres allegedly began to sexually harass her. Eventually, he ordered her to clean an area that had no surveillance cameras, and he allegedly used the opportunity to sexually assault her.

After Bouhamidi left custody, Torres allegedly contacted her by text message and Facebook to make sexual requests. Upon Bouhamidi’s reincarceration, she noticed Torres seemingly try to initiate sexual relations with other inmates. She filed a grievance against him in 2024. Several months later, she initiated a lawsuit.

Bouhamidi accused Torres of using excessive force and violating her right to bodily integrity. Torres has denied the allegations of wrongdoing.

She also named as defendants the executive director of the Colorado Department of Corrections, as well as the warden and associate warden of the Denver Women’s Correctional Facility. Bouhamidi alleged the department had a “zero-tolerance” policy on sexual contact between employees and detainees, but the management defendants turned a blind eye to longstanding issues of inmate abuse.

“It would have been obvious to those in Supervisory Defendants’ positions that inmates at DWCF, including Ms. Bouhamidi, faced a substantial risk of serious harm from sexual abuse by staff,” her lawyers wrote. “Supervisory Defendants failed to provide humane conditions of confinement for Ms. Bouhamidi and other similarly situated inmates by failing to implement practices, policies and procedures that protected inmates, including Ms. Bouhamidi, from the substantial risk of serious harm posed by prison staff using their positions to sexually harass and assault inmates.”

The supervisory defendants moved to dismiss Bouhamidi’s claims. They argued she had made no allegations about their individual actions or inaction, nor had she identified specific failures to train or supervise.

“Here, the Complaint contains no allegations that tend to show that any Supervisory Defendant was aware that Bouhamidi faced a substantial risk of harm or that they disregarded any such risk,” wrote the defense lawyers. “Indeed, the CDOC’s response in this matter demonstrates the opposite of deliberate indifference: as alleged, CDOC launched a prompt investigation in response to Bouhamidi’s grievance, which resulted in Torres’s suspension from the CDOC. These allegations demonstrate that Bouhamidi’s claims of sexual harassment were taken seriously, and quick action was taken.”

In a March 31 order, U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney believed Bouhamidi had credibly alleged the supervisory defendants could be held liable for Torres’ alleged use of force.

“Because Plaintiff has alleged that the CDOC Defendants had authority to create and manage the policies implemented at DWCF, she has sufficiently alleged the CDOC Defendants’ personal involvement in policy making,” Sweeney wrote.

Further, Bouhamidi had alleged that the defendants failed to remedy a longstanding problem of employee-on-inmate abuse, to the point where sexual assaults were an “approved practice.”

“Plaintiff also pleads that some of Defendant Torres’ inappropriate behaviors towards her were observed not only by other inmates, but by another DWCF staff member, as well,” Sweeney wrote. “These allegations provide additional support to Plaintiff’s contention that, at the very least, DWCF’s supervision policy was inadequate.”

The case is Bouhamidi v. Torres et al.