West Virginia State Police are investigating a state trooper accused of rape by a Charleston woman.

The woman alleges that she was drunk and forced to have sex with the trooper last month after he followed her to a friend's house where she was staying.

"I was nervous and scared because I didn't know what he was going to do to me," the woman said in an interview Thursday. She and her lawyer, Mike Clifford, also showed a Gazette reporter part of a videotape that apparently shows the woman and a man wearing a State Police uniform inside the woman's residence.

State Police superintendent Col. David Lemmon said the trooper is on restricted duty pending the outcome of the investigations. State Police Capt. G.A. Ingold confirmed he is conducting an internal investigation, and Lt. L.A. Bailes confirmed he is conducting a criminal investigation on the matter.

The woman, who is not being identified because she is an alleged rape victim, said she left The Vault, a bar in downtown Charleston, about 4:30 a.m. on Sunday, Nov. 16. She and a bar employee were driving to a restaurant when she was stopped by the trooper and pulled into the parking lot of Smiley's Restaurant and Lounge in Jefferson.

The woman said the trooper told her she was driving in the middle of the road, then performed a field sobriety test on her. She asked him if she was going to get a DUI, and he told her he didn't think she was that drunk. Then he asked her to get in his car, and after they talked for a short time, the trooper told her passenger to call a friend and get a ride home.

The trooper and the woman sat in the parking lot for about 15 minutes, she said. Then he allegedly asked her to unbutton her coat and told her she was attractive.

She said she started trying to deflect the trooper's interest, but he told her she was going to follow him in her car to another spot, where she would give him a kiss. He told her not to call anyone, she said.

They drove in separate cars to another spot, where the trooper, who is in his early 20s, began kissing and fondling her, she said.

"I went in survival mode," she said Thursday. "I couldn't call anybody because he was the police."

West Virginia State Police are investigating a state trooper accused of rape by a Charleston woman.

The woman alleges that she was drunk and forced to have sex with the trooper last month after he followed her to a friend's house where she was staying.

"I was nervous and scared because I didn't know what he was going to do to me," the woman said in an interview Thursday. She and her lawyer, Mike Clifford, also showed a Gazette reporter part of a videotape that apparently shows the woman and a man wearing a State Police uniform inside the woman's residence.

State Police superintendent Col. David Lemmon said the trooper is on restricted duty pending the outcome of the investigations. State Police Capt. G.A. Ingold confirmed he is conducting an internal investigation, and Lt. L.A. Bailes confirmed he is conducting a criminal investigation on the matter.

The woman, who is not being identified because she is an alleged rape victim, said she left The Vault, a bar in downtown Charleston, about 4:30 a.m. on Sunday, Nov. 16. She and a bar employee were driving to a restaurant when she was stopped by the trooper and pulled into the parking lot of Smiley's Restaurant and Lounge in Jefferson.

The woman said the trooper told her she was driving in the middle of the road, then performed a field sobriety test on her. She asked him if she was going to get a DUI, and he told her he didn't think she was that drunk. Then he asked her to get in his car, and after they talked for a short time, the trooper told her passenger to call a friend and get a ride home.

The trooper and the woman sat in the parking lot for about 15 minutes, she said. Then he allegedly asked her to unbutton her coat and told her she was attractive.

She said she started trying to deflect the trooper's interest, but he told her she was going to follow him in her car to another spot, where she would give him a kiss. He told her not to call anyone, she said.

They drove in separate cars to another spot, where the trooper, who is in his early 20s, began kissing and fondling her, she said.

"I went in survival mode," she said Thursday. "I couldn't call anybody because he was the police."

She said the trooper then told her to call the friends she was living with and tell them that a state trooper was coming to the house. She said she then drove home, with the trooper following her.

The woman said that when she got out of her car, she was so drunk she tried to go into the wrong house.

A surveillance video allegedly shows the scene inside the house where the woman was staying with a friend and her friend's husband. It was not clear why the surveillance video was set up.

Clifford, who has several other cases involving alleged police misconduct in the court system, allowed the woman to show part of the grainy video Thursday.

The video segment begins at about 5:30 a.m. A man is lying on a couch smoking a cigarette when a woman and another man apparently in a State Police uniform enter the picture. The woman and trooper greet the man, then go off-screen.

The woman said she and the trooper went into the guest bedroom of the house, where she was forced to perform oral sex on him, then have sex with him.

"I didn't have a choice, they had their 3-year-old son in the house. That's why I did these things," she said. "I was scared and nervous and didn't have anyone to call."

In the middle of having sex, the trooper "started freaking out" she said. He told her he had to get back on duty because he got off work at 8 a.m., she said Thursday.

The woman said she passed out when he left. She said she talked to her friend on Sunday about what she should do, and that she didn't take a shower Sunday. On Monday she talked to her divorce attorney, Shawn Bayliss, who sent her to Clifford. Clifford told her to go the hospital, where a rape kit was performed on her.

Reach Gary Harki at gha...@wvgazette.com or 348-5163.