Woman claims ex-Cumberland Township officer failed to investigate rape
A Rices Landing woman sued a former Cumberland Township police officer, claiming she failed to investigate a rape complaint.
The woman, according to the federal suit filed by attorney Joel Sansone, was drugged and raped in her home by a man she knows in June 2018.
In August 2020, the woman reported the rape and the name of the suspect to Cumberland Township police, and Melissa Adamson, an officer in the department, was assigned to investigate.
Sansone said the woman was told that Adamson had worked with sexual assault victims in the past and had handled similar cases.
Two months after she made the report to Adamson, the woman asked for an update on the investigation. Adamson told the woman that the case was “out of her hands,” according to the filing, and was sent to the state attorney general’s office.
The woman was not contacted by any investigator with the attorney general’s office, the suit alleges.
In April, the woman contacted the Greene County district attorney’s office to inquire about the investigation, but was told there was no record she had filed a report of rape.
A Cumberland Township Police detective then contacted the woman, and she again provided information about the assault. Sansone also alleged the woman received a text message from the chief of the police department telling her that Adamson had “messed up.”
Sansone claims in the lawsuit that Adamson personally knows the alleged rapist or his family members, and said the man is “well-known within the plaintiff’s small community.”
Adamson left her job with township police in April. The suit contends Adamson was fired, but township solicitor Dennis Makel said Thursday that she left because she found a full-time job with another department.
Adamson could not be reached for comment.
The case has since been sent to the attorney general’s office for investigation, the filing notes.
As a result of the delay in investigation, Sansone alleges the woman suffers from emotional distress, panic attacks, sleepless nights, loss of appetite, stomach and abdominal issues and blackouts.
She is seeking compensatory general damages, compensatory special damages, court costs, punitive damages and such other relief including injunctive and/or declaratory relief.