{"id":16651,"date":"2025-09-06T00:47:51","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T06:47:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/la-plata-jail-commander-accused-in-strip-search-case-faces-second-class-action-suit\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:00:05","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:00:05","slug":"la-plata-jail-commander-accused-in-strip-search-case-faces-second-class-action-suit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/la-plata-jail-commander-accused-in-strip-search-case-faces-second-class-action-suit\/","title":{"rendered":"La Plata jail commander accused in strip-search case faces second class-action suit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Capt.
Capt. Ed Aber of the La Plata County Sheriff\u2019s Office shared his personal experiences with and knowledge of PTSD in hopes others can better understand and address the symptoms that can arise from an accumulation of traumatic events. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A second class-action lawsuit has been filed against a former La Plata County Jail commander accused of using his law enforcement credentials to secretly watch strip-search videos of 117 female inmates over nearly five years.<\/p>\n

Law firms Rathod Mohamedbhai LLC and John Baxter, Attorney at Law \u2013 currently representing 18 of the 117 victims \u2013 named La Plata County Sheriff Sean Smith and two jail deputies, in addition to former jail Cmdr. Edward Aber, in the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit comes less than a month after an initial lawsuit <\/a>was filed on behalf of three other victims by civil rights attorneys from the Front Range.<\/p>\n

A news release issued by the two law firms involved in the latest case said the victims had been subject to \u201cphysical manipulation\u201d and \u201cpenetration\u201d by jail officials during filmed strip searches.<\/p>\n

Aber used his law enforcement credentials to view the strip-search videos on evidence.com at least 3,166 times <\/a>for his own sexual gratification, according to an affidavit filed by the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.<\/p>\n

The release also acknowledged the sexual harassment allegations previously made against Aber by more than a dozen female co-workers at the jail.<\/p>\n

\u201cAber\u2019s reign of terror came to an end only when fourteen female Jail employees collectively came forward to report that Commander Aber had sexually harassed them,\u201d the release said. \u201cOnly then did investigators think to check Commander Aber\u2019s history of accessing the female strip search videos.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neil Sandhu, lead attorney at Rathod Mohamedbhai LLC, told The Durango Herald<\/em> that the lawsuit extends beyond Aber to include Sheriff Smith and several other jail personnel, to pursue accountability from those who may have enabled the former commander\u2019s behavior.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout question, (former) Cmdr. Aber shares much of the blame for the abuse that he inflicted on these victims, but he\u2019s not the only one that shares that blame,\u201d Sandhu said. \u201cBlame lies also with the county, the sheriff and the deputies inside the jail who allowed this campaign of abuse to be inflicted upon these victims.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

Like the initial lawsuit filed last month, the damages sought by the 18 victims go beyond monetary compensation, Sandhu said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re also seeking systematic change within the jail \u2013 changes to the manner in which strip search (videos) are used, whether they\u2019re recorded, whether those recordings are stored and how (they\u2019re stored), and who\u2019s able to access them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Aber is charged with of 117 counts of invasion of privacy and one count of official misconduct \u2013 all misdemeanors.<\/p>\n

Protection, non-harassment and no-contact orders were filed last month<\/a> for all victims.<\/p>\n

Aber is scheduled for a pretrial hearing 9 a.m. Oct. 13 in La Plata County Court and a motions hearing at 10 a.m. Wednesday.<\/p>\n

epond@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

18 victims seek damages, changes to strip-search policies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,1024,1194,1025,1373],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-la-plata-county-jail","tag-la-plata-county-sheriffs-office","tag-law-and-justice","tag-litigation"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16651"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16651\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21198,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16651\/revisions\/21198"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16651"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}