Transcript provides details of RPD tampering case

By Brian Smith Register News Writer

RICHMOND — The transcript of a Kentucky State Police interview with the woman at the center of a witness tampering case involving three Richmond police officers sheds new light on the circumstances surrounding the case.

The woman, April McQueen, gave the interview along with her attorney, Louisville lawyer Mary Sharp, to a state police investigator Jan. 27 at Post 7 in Richmond.

The interview took place just a day before a Madison County grand jury returned the indictments against Sgt. James “J.J.” Rogers and officers Brian Hensley and Garry Murphy for allegedly influencing McQueen to change her story about a sexual encounter involving the officers.

McQueen details in the interview the Oct. 26, 2009, encounter she had with the officers.

The transcript was one of a number of documents unsealed by Madison Circuit Judge William G. Clouse on Thursday following a pretrial conference for Rogers, Hensley and Murphy.

“On Oct. 26, 2009, there were three Richmond police officers that came to my apartment, one of which I was already friends with. He brought two other with him,” McQueen told state police investigator Matt Feltner.

McQueen identifies Rogers, Murphy and Hensley by name to Feltner in the interview, although she told Feltner she did not know Hensley’s first name.

“We had made arrangements to have sex,” McQueen said. “Basically, we had sex. There was a time that, you know, I was kind of weirded out a little bit because the one wanted me to drink urine. And I’ve never done that before. It was kind of shocking, and I said, you know, I really don’t want to.”

Later in the interview, McQueen gives a more complete and graphic account of the incident in which she claims Murphy grabbed her head and forced her to allow him and Rogers to urinate in her mouth as part of what she terms a “domination game.”

“He grabs my head and he said, drink it,” McQueen said. “And I said, no, I really — I’m not really into it. And he said, yes, you are.”

McQueen said it was at that point Murphy struck her.

“Then he slapped me five times in the face, which I said, the slapping was consensual,” McQueen said,

She said Murphy used profanity in ordering her to drink the urine and then he and Rogers started urinating.

Murphy later apologized to McQueen, she said. “He claims that he’s sorry, and that it was just him playing up the role.”

McQueen also told Feltner about suffering a “busted lip” because of Murphy.

“You know, Murphy says it was an accident that my lip was busted. And I mean, I don’t know that it wasn’t an accident,” McQueen said.

Murphy faces a misdemeanor charge of fourth-degree assault for alleging “hitting and slapping” McQueen, according to the indictment.

McQueen denied the officers raped her, and told Feltner she had another sexual encounter with a probation officer from Rockcastle County later the same day before Madison County sheriff’s deputies interviewed her.

“The next morning, I guess it was around 10:00, I had another guy come over. He’s the probation officer in Rockcastle. He came over and we had sex,” McQueen said in the interview.

McQueen told Feltner she had visited a neighbor after the encounter with the Richmond officers to get an ice pack for her mouth.

“I asked her if she had an ice pack basically because my mouth was really swollen, and I was going to meet this guy for the first time the next day,” McQueen said.

The neighbor contacted sheriff’s investigators, McQueen said, and McQueen alleges that her neighbors and the investigators forced her to go to the hospital for an examination.

“And I said, you know, fine, if you all just leave me alone, I’ll go to the hospital and get checked out, but I’m not going to do the rape kit,” McQueen said. “I never did the rape kit because I wasn’t raped.”

McQueen said while at the hospital, a nurse urged her to take the rape kit, saying that the officers “have done this before to other women in this town, and they need to be fired.”

The day after the encounter, McQueen said she called Rogers, who urged her to contact Sheriff Nelson O’Donnell to “clear up” the situation because Rogers was being considered for a promotion.

“Rogers said, you know, we need to go down there and clear this up if this is supposed to be dropped. He’s like I’m up for a promotion, a $15,000 promotion. He’s like, we have to go clear this up,” McQueen said.

Rogers then drove McQueen to the sheriff’s office, where the two spoke separately to O’Donnell and Detective Steve King, McQueen said.

O’Donnell told McQueen the case would not be prosecuted and “nothing was going to happen to them,” she said.

The attorneys for Rogers, Hensley and Murphy, Lexington lawyers Scott Crosbie and Jim Deckard, quoted a portion of the interview in a filing last week regarding prosecutors contacting McQueen.

The quoted portion indicated that Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Jennifer Hall Smith had stopped a tape recording of a Nov. 12 interview with McQueen, and quotes Sharp asking McQueen how Smith would stop the tape recorder.

The full transcript indicates that Sharp was present for that interview with Smith.

The transcript also provides additional details about a possible lawsuit McQueen and Sharp had planned to file against O’Donnell.

In the interview, McQueen said that O’Donnell contacted her multiple times asking for a copy of the suit, which never was filed.

“He’s like, these people are real pieces of work. And thank you so much, this really helps me out,” McQueen quotes O’Donnell as saying. “I know exactly what I’m going to be sued for if there is going to be a lawsuit.”

McQueen also alleges in the interview that her landlord threatened her with eviction “if I don’t go through with this what you want me to say at the grand jury.”

The threat, McQueen said, was related to accusations that Richmond police officers had attempted to rape the landlord’s 16-year-old daughter.

“So she honestly had the personal vendetta with the RPD in the beginning anyway,” McQueen said about her landlord.

Clouse scheduled a March 22 trial for the officers, and an evidentiary hearing is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Monday for Clouse to determine whether Smith can be required to testify as a witness in the trial.



Brian Smith may be reached at bsmith@richmondregister.com or at 624-6694. For breaking news, follow Brian at www.twitter.com/RR_BSmith.

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