Another 81 women who say they were “subjected to invasive, unnecessary, and degrading touching, voyeurism, and covert filming” are joining a lawsuit originally filed in November against Army Maj. Blaine McGraw, a gynecologist who was charged this week with secretly recording his patients during exams.
The new filing was submitted on Wednesday by attorneys representing the alleged victims less than 24 hours after the Army’s Office of Special Trial Counsel charged McGraw with 54 specifications, or alleged incidents, of “indecent visual recording,” along with several other related charges. The case being brought against McGraw by the Army includes 44 alleged victims.
While the military’s charges against McGraw filed this week focus on the recording of his patients, the expanded lawsuit on Wednesday accuses McGraw of sexual assault, assault, and battery under Texas law, saying he “intentionally and knowingly made harmful and offensive physical contact” with patients during their exams. Fort Hood, where McGraw saw patients starting in 2023, is in Texas.
In one example included in Wednesday’s filing an active-duty soldier said she believes McGraw took photos of her during a rape kit examination after she was sexually assaulted.
“During that deeply vulnerable procedure, he was constantly on his phone while between her legs,” the lawsuit says, adding that the woman now believes that he was taking photos of her while performing the exam.
The lawsuit says that McGraw “failed to document in her medical records that a rape kit had ever been performed,” and in the criminal case against her alleged rapist, the prosecution “lacked clear forensic documentation, and her assailant was ultimately acquitted.”
“McGraw’s misconduct in this setting did not merely fail to protect a victim of sexual violence; it actively undermined her access to justice and allowed her perpetrator to escape accountability,” the lawsuit says.
The Army has emphasized that officials are taking the allegations against McGraw seriously. Fort Hood has said in statements that investigators began looking into McGraw within hours of a patient’s allegation on October 17 and suspended McGraw immediately.
