BANGOR, Maine — A decision issued Monday by the U.S. Supreme Court will allow more people booked in Maine jails to be strip searched.
How soon changes will be implemented remained unclear the day after the 5-4 ruling that jail security trumped individual privacy guaranteed under the Fourth Amendment.
Until Monday’s decision, Maine allowed strip searches of detainees charged with crimes involving violence, drugs or weapons. Arrestees charged with other crimes, whether felonies or misdemeanors, were not subject to strip searches unless there was a reasonable suspicion the person possessed a weapon, controlled substance or other contraband.
Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross said Tuesday that individuals who are able to make bail in a few hours will not be strip searched at the Penobscot County Jail. The court’s decision will apply only to arrestees who are unable to make bail or must appear before a judge, he said.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling said that arrestees who were to be placed in the general population of a jail could be strip searched no matter what charges they were facing.
“We are not going to start strip-searching everyone who comes through the door,” Ross said. “We want to look at whether people charged with minor crimes and are low risk [for bringing in contraband] might be placed in a separate area away from the general population.”
Ross, who is head of the Maine Sheriffs Association, said he and other sheriffs would talk with Waterville lawyer Peter Marchesi about how and when strip search policies should change in light of the decision.
Marchesi defended York and Knox counties in separate class action lawsuits filed in U.S. District Court over illegal strip searches at their jails. He also has defended other counties, including Penobscot County, in lawsuits filed by individuals over strip-search practices.
“This is a welcome decision for correctional facilities in Maine and nationwide,” Marchesi said Tuesday in an email. “It comports with what Maine’s counties have been arguing in court for years: that the ‘reasonable suspicion’ requirement to strip search so-called ‘minor’ offenders has never been endorsed by the United States Supreme Court, and is/was a standard that represented improper court interference with correctional officials’ efforts to operate safe jails.”
Marchesi said he would be working with county jail officials to bring “current policies into conformity with the decision, namely, relaxing current restrictions on certain searches.”
Newport lawyer Dale Thistle, who has successfully sued several county jails over their strip-search policies, called Monday’s decision “horrible, absolutely horrible.”
“It wrongly allows institutional security, without justification, to trump constitutional liberty,” he said Tuesday in a telephone interview. “I believe that the Supreme Court just gave carte blanche to prisons and jails throughout the country to mix everybody who is arrested in with the general population of the institution. General population — that is the catch phrase.”
Thistle predicted that soon nearly everyone arrested in Maine who could not easily be held in a booking area until posting bail would be strip searched and placed in the general population of a jail.
“Now that the decision to strip-search a person is no longer dependent on the seriousness of crime or the circumstances surrounding the arrest, if you get stopped for some [minor] crime but go to jail, you can be strip searched,” he said. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a finable or jailable offense.”
The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine said there is nothing in the Supreme Court’s ruling that would force Maine jails to change their policies.
“Fortunately, we have regulations here in Maine that govern when a prisoner may be strip-searched and by whom,” Zachary Heiden, an attorney for the ACLU of Maine, said Tuesday in an email. “Maine’s regulations are not affected by the Supreme Court’s decision, and jail and prison personnel need to continue to follow the Maine rules.
“The best way to preserve the privacy of the thousands of Mainers who are arrested each year (often for minor offenses) is not to put them in jail in the first place,” he continued. “There are cheaper and more effective alternatives to incarceration available for people arrested on minor offenses.”
The decision, Marchesi said, balanced the individual’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, with jail officials’ need to maintain security and to keep contraband, particularly drugs, out of penal institutions.
“As the decision highlights,” Marchesi said, “jails are extremely dangerous places, fraught with the risk of extreme violence, disease, and harm to inmates, staff and the visiting public. This decision recognizes those risks for what they are, and restores to the correctional experts the ability to manage those risks, using appropriate correctional tools, without undue judicial interference.”
Ross said that tobacco, prescription drugs and bath salts have been smuggled recently into the Penobscot County Jail by people who were not subject to strip searches.
That, according to Thistle, will be of little comfort to people who after Monday’s ruling will be subject to strip searches for minor offenses. He said he has talked with thousands of people who were illegally strip searched in Maine jails. All described it as the most humiliating experience of their lives, he said.
“I’ve had men and women break down in tears when they talked about their experiences being strip-searched,” Thistle said. “This decision is just going to lead to more abuse.”
Ross said he and his staff would be working with Marchesi to find something in between the current policy and strip searching nearly everyone who is booked into the Penobscot County Jail.
We as United States citizens can now be killed anywhere on Earth upon the order of our President, snatched off the streets and held indefinitely without charge or trial, arrested for peacefully protesting on government property, wiretapped without warrant, have all our email and text messages intercepted by the NSA, and now strip searched in jail.
USA 1789-2012. R.I.P.
ya tom….and we call it freedom…liberty and justice for all…
Time for a new political party based on the constitution. We need to jettison these partisan wingnuts and their pet bureaucrats from power. Too bad voters are so easily influenced by 30 second ads, shiny white teeth and a $500 haircut.
vote for Ron Paul.
How does it feel to wear a tinfoil hat all the time?
How does it feel to be so totally unaware of what’s been happening in your own country…
I have to wonder, are you Canadian ?
I was born in the United States thank you very little and I’m well aware of what is going on. I’m just not a paranoid person and the NSA is not keeping tabs on me, or you or anyone posting about this news story.
I just don’t listen to or follow crazy people such as Glenn Beck. He is the master of the tin foil hat.
Kevin, You are usually more aware then this. It is no big secret, check out your search engine, and find out. US Citizens on US soil can be taken, jailed, and killed on the President’s order if they are SUSPECTED to be terrorists.
And how many US citizens has this happened too?
At least one that we know of. Probably more.
And who is this one person?
Anwar al-Aulaqi was an American citizen that Obama ordered killed.
And he was also a real terrorist so your point is pretty mute.
Kevin Geez what have you been drinking??? The man (under our system) is NOT a terrorist UNTIL the court rules he is. It IS an inefficient system to be sure you have to do all these silly things like provide for the defense, as well as the prosecution, and prove to twelve US citizens that the alleged act was in fact committed. I see no Constitutionally approved shortcuts save a declaration of marshal law. Last time I looked no one has declared marshal law nationally since the civil War.
We are sliding toward a totalitarian state, and neither the left nor the right seems to care.
We do not know that. He was an American citizen who was not tried or convicted of anything. Making assumptions about how guilty someone is should not be a way of convicting someone in this country.
Anwar al-Aulaqi, hmm, isn’t he the guy that left the US, where he was a citizen, to join Alqaeda in their declared war on the US? As such he became an enemy combatant. He was killed in Yemen if I’m not mistaken. As far as I know the Yemen government frowns on the FBI or any other US law enforcement personel conducting arrests on their soverign territory. Obama made ther right call and also did the right thing dealing with bin Laden.
So it is OK to execute people without benefit of trial? It is OK to enter foreign countries, and execute people who are convicted of nothing? It is OK to violate the sovereignty of other nations without a declaration of war?
If this is the case, how are we any better than China, Iran, Syria, or a host of other nations that take this type of action. Where is the “moral authority” we learned about in the sixth grade?
Harry, Alqaeda declared war on the US. We are at war with them. They consider us fair game and we consider their soldiers fair game. It was their war that they declared and they set the ground rules. Their ground rules said there are no holds barred. Do I like it? No. I would love to see us return to pre-9/11 times. The situation is not of our making. In my younger years I learned that if someone starts a fight with a sucker punch, all rules are out the window.
So then your solution is when fighting terrorists, Nazis, etc. you fight using thyeir rules?
Don’t get me wrong. My reaction after 9-11 was to nuke Afghanistan into a large crystallized lake. This AFTER issuing a declaration of war.
I do not support the idea that we can label anyone in the world a terrorist, and thereby justify taking them out. This is EXACTLY what Hitler did with the Reichstag fire. He blamed the “Communists, and declared all “Communists” fair game even those who held public (elected) office.
This is dangerous ground ESPECIALLY in the current era where we face some of the same problems Germany faced between the two wars. It is easy for politicians to target “a boogeyman” and use that target to take out those who might derail a political movement. I know, I know… “That can’t happen here” “Nazis were an anomaly” “The Hitler card doesn’t work in the computer era”
BUT
When U.S. citizens take with no doubt the death and burial at sea of Osama BinLaden, and no one asks why an unarmed man could not be brought before the world court, my cynical anti-government senses kick in. I ask myself strange stuff like “what were they afraid he would say?” Remember Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden was our ally when he fought the old Soviet Union to a standstill. For that matter so was Muhammad Hosni El Sayed Mubarak of Egypt where one terrorist was a national., Hussein bin Talal of Jordan, Hafez ibn ‘Ali ibn Sulayman al-Assad of Syria, and our friend to this day, the King of Saudi Arabia where fifteen of the nineteen terrorists of 9/11 were citizens.
When we fought the Nazis, to my knowlege, we didn’t pull our punches and neither did they. Comparing the conditions in this country to that of Nazi Germany??? You really have to be kidding. That is one stetch I’ll not bother getting into.
bin Laden was one of our allies in Afghanistan. Why he turned on us is a question that I don’t believe we will ever get an answer to.
We have gone to war several times with former allies. Ho Chi Minh comes to mind. One of our strongest and most succesful allies in SE Asia. Drove the Japanese Army nuts, using the same tactics that he used against the French and then us. If I recall from what I read about him, he really wasn’t a communist at heart. All he ever really wanted was to unite Vietnam. Mao was the only one to give him support.
Not the point. It is allowed. The proclamation was issued in February. give them time.
Yeah, but freedom reigns if corporations are judged to be people. Thnkfully, we have a conservative court that has also ruled that the gov’t can take land and give it to private corporations. It has also ruled that police can arrest you if they “accidently” use illegal methods to obtain evidence. Now this. Again, this conservative court has shown that individual rights don’t matter except for the 2nd amendment.
Now corporate rights, that’s a whole nother matter.
I should love to agree with you, unfortunately your facts are skewed.
In Kello v New London Justice Stevens wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justices Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer. This group of folks was considered “the liberal block” Justice Kennedy wrote a concurring opinion. The dissent on June 25, 2005 was written by Justice O’Connor, joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justices Scalia and Clarence Thomas. These folks were considered the conservatives. The conservative opinion suggested that the use of eminent domain in a reverse Robin Hood fashion (take from the poor, give to the rich) would become the norm, not the exception.
The case for corporate person-hood was decided in 1886.
There is more, but you get my drift.
The case in 1886 was not for speech, it was primarily for the enforcement of contracts. The recent decision gave corps personhood for the purposes of speech. I wish they would decide that some corps also could be executed for their behavior, sort of what happened to Anderson the accounting firm after their shenanigans were revealed.
BTW, Kennedy is NOT considered to be in the liberal bloc. I miss O’Connor, and Thomas has proven himself to be the buffoon he was predicted to be.
Unless you tell me the name of the Law school you attended, I’m done with this discussion. Like so many partisans you see all the bad (on the “other side”) but fail to accept that the world is not black and white.
You started by discussing “corporate rights” (your words) then you shift to “free speech” in your reply.
The 1886 case of Santa Clara
County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company, the U.S. Supreme Court
decided that a private corporation is a person. This court simply affirmed that ruling (called precedent) If they had ruled in opposition to that precedent, THAT would have been judicial activism. The ruling was simple, and I agree with the court’s finding. A person, under the law, has a right to free speech. Using established law (the 1886 case) the case becomes moot.
I don’t see the world as a b/w thing. But you only see postitons that will enrich your client, or else allow somebody to escape blame. Lawyers are good at arguing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but never see right and wrong, only relevance.
Shifting to free speech is because personhood does not automatically convey all the rights a free person has.
I too am done with you. Arguing with a lawyer is pointless. They shift around, change meanings and generally consider themselves superior to others. Because they have command of the law they think they have it all figured out. Mostly they abet the crooks.
That would sound like a personal attack EXCEPT, I’m not a lawyer. Going to law school does not make one an attorney.
America the beautiful…..
For starters, the easy solution is to stay out of jail. It’s really not that hard. I would bet that the huge majority of people in this country have only seen the inside of a jail on TV.
Secondly, I highly doubt that people will be strip searched for minor, bailable infractions. Unless of course they can’t manage to get someone to bring them $6o for the bail commisioner. They in all likely hood will be kept in the intake area of the jail for the time it takes them to be bailed.
Thirdly, If you happen to have put in the effort to be arrested. Please try to remain calm in the intake area. The people that work there didn’t arrest you nor did they ask you to commit whatever infraction that got you there in the first place. They have a job to do and will do it as soon as they possibly can. For the most part they are almost as eager as you to see you bailed and out of their facility. Your patience and cooperation will be highly appreciated.
Attorney Thistle is outraged. Geeze Dale look at all that lawsuit money slipping through your fingers. You should be outraged by your fellow Attorneys on the Supreme Court who made this ruling.
State constitutions don’t trump the US constitution.
I am sure that the jail staff are breathing a sigh of relief for this ruling. They are the people on the front line who have to deal with what comes through the door.
You can be arrested for peacefully protesting. That gives the perverted cops the right to strip search you? This is only done to humiliate and dehumanize citezens and make them fear their gov’t.
No you can’t! You can be arrested for not doing as told, like move or move along, or get out of this park and so on. Plus, you also know that if you were to get arrested, a strip search is coming. You campers pushed the limits and were pushing to be arrested to prove a point (still not sure what it was) then cried about being stripped searched? Just can!t make you campers happy!
In the dream world you live in, nobody is ever unlawfully arrested and the police never over-step their authority.
You are on the wrong track. The people manning the jails are there to insure the safety and security of the jail. They could care less what you are protesting. In fact they probably won’t know anything about you until you are brought in. At that point in time you will be given a pat down search by the appropriate (male or female) officer. You will be booked, at which time it will be determined if you can make bail. If you can be bailed, they in all likelyhood will not strip search you. You will be placed in a holdinc cell.
I have been in jail (not prison) in New York, Mississippi, Washington D.C. Maine, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. I have NO record, other than the “contact cards” all jurisdictions keep. I need to tell you patom that all those jails are staffed by different types of people with totally different points of view.
Your experience (which I do not question) has not been mine.
I have to ask, what was your reason for being inside all these jails. I’m guessing that you were there as a councilor of some sort. If you just come in and visit inmates and interact with them one on one, you won’t get to know them as they act when not trying to get something from you.
As in all walks of life, not everyone has the same point of view. Viva la differance.
I was an inmate. Mostly minor tussles with the law in my younger drinking days. In Mississippi I was jailed for being on a Federal (Indian) reservation without due authority. I was bringing food in to starving children. I spent the night as the only inmate playing Spades and drinking beer with the guard who was a really nice fellow, and half Indian. NOTHING is black and white.
“Stay out of jail. It’s really not that hard. I would bet that the huge majority of people in this country have only seen the inside of a jail on TV.”
Apparently you’re unaware of the fact that the United States of America has by far the highest incarceration rate in the world. “Land of the Free?” Not by a long shot.
The America some people live in IS their TV.
I am very aware of the number of people imprisoned. The large majority of them who are sent to a full blown prison are repeat offenders and mental patients. In a kinder more generous nation the mental patients would be in hospitals that are designed and staffed with people that specialize in that field. Unfortunately we don’t live in one of those nations.
I believe the population is somehwere around 300 million. The number of people incarcerated is about 3 million. The number of people who have ever been inside of a jail as an inmate is probably somewhat less than 10 million, due to the fact that a lot of them make the same decisions repeatedly that got them arrested in the first place.
Land of the free, if by free you believe that people that get arrested and go to jail have the freedom to bring in drugs, tobaco, weapons, etc., that can be used to harm others and create more mahem. I think the supreme court has ruled that you may be strip searched to prevent you from doing that.
You are assuming that cops never make mistakes and arrest innocent people. Why do you doubt that overzealous govt types won’t strip search everyone? TSA officers took their searches to the extreme in regards to elderly folks and children. You comfortable with your daughter being strip searched for shoplifting? I’d love to think that this would never be abused because we are all part of the same society, but I’m not holding my breath.
I am not assuming that cops don’t make mistakes. This is not about the cops. This is about the safety and security of the jails.
The personel manning the jails don’t go out and arrest people. They do not have the authority to arrest people nor the authrity to judge them. They are merely there to insure that whoever comes into the jail is kept safe and that others in the jail are kept safe from them.
Are you comfortable with your daughter being arrested for shoplifting? If she is strip searched it will be by a female corrections officer.
“If she is strip searched it will be by a female corrections office”
No that is incorrect. A female officer will be provided ONLY when one is available. Same true with male prisoners and male searchers.
Source please. In the 8 years I spent in that job. There was never an opposite sex strip search conducted at the jail I worked at. If there were, you would have had headlines all overt the plade and Dale Thistle would have been camped out on the jail door step.
Again P your experience is narrow (I ASS-U-ME New England?) Down south women (who admittedly look like men) do male strip searches often. The “source” is my narrow experience,
My son has worked in a prison down south and his girl friend currently works in one, North Carolina. Neither do strip searches of opposite sex inmates.
Never been in jail in North Carolina. Been in Texas, and Mississippi and both of those States do cross gender “guarding” including watching inmates shower.
Not that I watch Fox or CNN or any of the other TV news shows that much, I do on occasion watch 60 minutes. I have never heard of this. If it’s true and you have the proof of it, I’m sure one of these news groups would be on that like a dog on a bone.
Edit to remove.
You must be some kind of cop to believe the trife you write, This ruling is so bad it will result in backlash to correct it
Nope. I worked in Corrections. If you have a particular argument to counter my ‘trife’, I would be glad to discuss it with you.
My argument is simple. There should be no “strip search” until the subject is convicted of a crime. Any other option tromps on the rights of the innocent. Ben Franklin suggested that it is better to allow six guilty men their freedom rather than jail one innocent. He also felt that trading liberty for security was a poor idea.
Are you as a taxpayer prepared to foot the bill for all the injuries and drug overdoses that would result from a no search policy?
Are you as a taxpayer ready to pay out all the money for law suits because the “policy” pissed off innocent people? There is a simple solution which was acceptable up to the 1960’s
Use bail SOLELY to insure a suspect’s appearance. house suspects unable to make bail in isolation cells. Simple stuff really. Just follow the rules in the Constitution and everyone wins.
Oh if that were possible Harry, there simply isn’t room enough in most of our jails to accomodate all the special needs people. Besides the tax payers will pitch a fit about the cost of constructing a jail that would accomidate what you envision.
Bail is used to insure a suspects appearance. Those who can’t make bail, for whatever reason will be arraigned by the judge ASAP.
I know the system WELL. ASAP has gotten slower and slower. bail is now assessed by crime without regard to the subject’s likelihood to appear, and the slowness of the system DOES leave far too many people in jails(as opposed to prisons) where they take up space which could be better used.
I am coming to a point where I believe that only people who commit violent acts (including threatening violence) belong in prison. The rest should be doing community service and paying back their victims. In cases of fraud, theft and unarmed B&E, the civil system is under used.
That ain’t gonna happen either, but I can still complain about it.
Harry, I know not of where you speak. I do know that the closest facility to you does not work the way you describe.
I don’t have a clue how the closest facility to me operates, Never been a guest there.
So shouldn’t all prison guards and jail guards be strip-searched before they enter and leave their facilities? Guards and other prison and jail staff ARE implicated in many if not most of the smuggling going on between prisoners and the outside. (It ain’t coming in inside birthday cakes) Patom1 would know this. The guards & staff are a small % of Mainers, and are the most direct interface between prisoners and the outside. For the safety and security of Maine’s public,
shouldn’t these public servants give up their privacy rights and be strip searched twice daily? THAT would reduce smuggling in and out of jail and prison by about 90%. They should be proud to serve Maine this way.
lol, good try Ron.
First off, the guards haven’t commited a crime. Aren’t under arrest. Therefore they aren’t subject to strip search.
Second, they can’t hire and retain enough people as it is to fill the positions needed. Mainly because this is a lousy job to begin with. If it weren’t for the benefits package they wouldn’t be able to lure what they do get to work in a jail or prison.
Thirdly, the average career for a Corrections Officer nationaly is 5 years. Most burn out.
I worked for 57 years at one job or another mostly (30 yrs.) driving truck. I can honestly say that of all the jobs I did in my life, Corrections is the only job that I litterally learned to hate. I got to the point where I hated getting out of bed and going to work. Between dealing with the inmates and every step you took being watched I really don’t know how I stood it as long as I did. Not complaining. It was my decision at the time and a lack of different opportunities where I live. I learned things that I would just as soon not want to know.
Yes there are bad CO’s. There are as in every other occupation more good than bad. The bad CO’s usually screw up and get caught and are dealt with appropriately.
If you wish and have the power to force CO’s to be strip searched twice a day, then you should be prepared to pay one hell of a lot more, to make it worth the aggravation.
you want safe jails, make safe streets. the revolving door just got creepier.
And if you don’t want jails, stop putting people ON the streets.
The revolving door makes a lot of people a lot of money, at the public’s expense.
Wahhhh! That’s what jail is supposed to be…the loss of most rights. If you don’t like the policies in there, then DON’T GO!
What a delightfully fascist mindset.
Would you prefer to be locked up with someone who smuggled in some crack in his crack?
sadly, around here a lot of people would say yes!
Not everyone who goes to jail is a bad person – some aren’t even guilty of any crime – and even if it were terrible people going to jail, they’re still human beings who deserve a certain amount of dignity and respect. Going to jail means the loss of many of your rights, not all of them.
You are absolutely correct that not everyone that goes to jail is a bad person. In fact it has been my experience that the greater majority of people that get arrested are not evil/bad people.
However, it is because of those who actually are evil/bad and have bad intentions that these practices exist. Unfortunately the people maning the jails aren’t capable of reading minds to determine who or which person entering the jail as an inmate is the true evil one.
People who go to jail usually belong there, our jails are luxury spas compared to the rest of the world; that isn’t a deterrent to criminal behavior.
Actually, today, a large number of people go to jail for USING drugs. This was a freedom we had when this country was new, but one we lost through lack of vigilance.
Our jails are not spas. I worked in our Dickensian reform school system, and it is more akin to living in the wash bay of your local car wash than it is like a spa.
Good thought if innocent people didn’t get dumped in all to often.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/oct/12/high-court-look-routine-strip-searches-jail/
Your method is great until the article is about you. Hopefully our elected sheriffs will have reasonable policies and an effort to keep minor offenders out of the general population.
Don’t hold your breath.
They work in an industry that is dependent upon plenty of people being locked-up.
You want a safer jail? Then you strip search all the prisoners being placed in that facility, it cuts down on weapons, drugs, and other contraband. How would you feel if you were in a jail and your getting stabbed by a guy who got a knife into the jail because he was not searched? It is a policy that will help keep all of the people in jails safer, and I do mean all people, there are not just prisoners there you know!
Or does it get more dangerous for people arrested for minor offenses? Now if you want to strip search everyone just put them all in the general population. People arrested for minor offenses or unpaid fines don’t belong in general population but this will be the easy way to justify your extreme of stripping everyone. I’ll take restrained government over safety any day of the week. Too me that is safety.
I think you’ve gone to an extreme. I doubt that every person brought into a jail will be strip searched unless they are going to be put into general population.
You brought up unpaid fines. A little advice. If you have a fine, it is usually adjudicated in front of a judge. The judge’s will tell you where to pay your fine and when it is due. They will ask you if you can pay the fine in full. If you can’t they will set up a payment plan and ask you what you can afford. In other words they bend over backwards to accomidate you.
If you can’t make a payment, all you need to do is report to where the payment is to be paid and explain the reason you can’t make that payment and these people will usually attempt to give you another date or other arrangements. That is the easy way
If you decide to take the harder road. Blow it off and ignore the payment. The nice judge will issue a warrant for your arrest. You will be arrested and brought to jail. At that time, for this offense you will be afforded the opportunity to pay your fine in full, plus the $60 bail commisioners fee. If you don’t have the money to bail, you will sit in jail until you get arraigned by the court. Then the process will begin all over again.
Some people just don’t get it and are quite comfortable with doing this song and dance. All of which costs the tax payers money.
The guy paid his fine. The clerk forgot to tell the computer.
Then sue the clerk, the court, etc. The problem didn’t originate in the jail.
You’re wrong. Some jails do indeed have a policy to strip search everybody. That is what happened in this case. So your porposition that it is rare or extreme is wrong, it is a matter of policyin some places in this country.
What happened in this case was this:
The man was fined. He paid the fine. The fine was not recorded. He checked on it, knew this and tried to remedy the situation. He went so far as to get a paper with the seal of the state of NJ on it, signed by a judge, that stated that he had paid the fine. He had this paper with him, he showed it to the cop. He was arrested anyway. Stripped 2 times, kept in jail for a week, then released with no charges.
Now we have a Supreme Court that says that this was all ok. And you think so too. Whew, where are we going in this country?
Once again. Was the guy arrested by the jail? NO. The fault of him being arrested was the courts. Not the the people who work in the jail. It was not the jails fault that he wasn’t brought before a judge. That is up to the DA’s and the Court again. The people in the jail are not judge, jury, or arresting officers. They are concerned with the safety and security of the jail. That is what the supremes ruled on.
The fault of his arrest was the cops. But, before he was judged, before they even showed probable cause, they stripped him. Justice? Only in the mind of somebody who was never wrongfully arrested like I was.
Once again, the people that are working in the jail are concerned with the security and safety of the jail. That is their primary concern. They are NOT the judge. They are NOT the police. They are not the DA’s office.
THE SAFETY AND SECURITY OF THE JAIL AND THE ABILITY OF THE PERSONEL TO MAINTAIN THAT SAFETY AND SECURITY IS WHAT THE SUPREME COURT RULED ON.
WHERE DO YOU READ THAT STRIPPING ALL PRISONERS WILL CUT DOWN ON CONTRABAN? THE STRIPPING OF EVERYBODY, EVEN THOSE WHO ARE WRONGLY ARRESTED IS A SOLUTION IN SEARCH OF A PROBLEM.
AGAIN, IT IS THE CONTINUING EROSION OF A PERSONS RIGHTS THAT MAKES THIS COUNTRY LESS FREE. THE 4TH AMENDMENT MAKES UNREASONABLE SEARCHES ILLEGAL, BUT YOU SEEM TO THINK IT IS OK TO STRIP EVERYBODY WHO COMES INTO A JAIL EVEN IF THE PERSON IS WRONGLY CONFINED. I CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHY SOME PEOPLE THINK THAT IS FINE.
This is not about people who have been convicted and sent to a long term facility. This is about the local jail, where most contraban is brought in by employees.
How would you feel if you, your sister or your brother was arrested by the state police for no reason. The local state cop might just want to see you/them naked.
This might be far-fetched, but so is the notion that most arestees will have contraban in their body orifaces.
If people are subject to these strip searches over minor offenses, don’t be shy. Let us all know. One of the great parts of electing county sheriffs is the fact that we can fire them in the next election. It would behoove them to keep their people well trained and restrained if they wish to keep wearing their badges.
Obviously, in view of their well documented role in getting contraband to prisoners, all prison guards and jail guards need to be strip-searched each time they enter a corrections facility on the way into the building and on the way out at the end of their shifts.
The person who brought the suit was arrested and strip searched twice for not paying a fine that he had, in fact, paid. In other words, he was innocent. The SCOTUS has now made it possible for any innocent person to go through what this man went through.
Some people used to claim that activist judges were ruining this country, primarily when a more liberal position was ruled on favorably. Now that it’s conservative positions that take away our property, our electoral process and our constitutional rights these people are silent …..
The SCOTUS was not rulling on this guy being arrested twice for unpaid fines. Nor that it was a bum arrest in that he had already paid the fine.
The SCOTUS rulled that jails have the right to protect themselves and their inmates from people bringing in contraband. The jails have NOTHING to do with this person or anyother person being brought into the jail. That is done by police on the street.
So if a cop sees a nice looking lady, he can arrest her, take her to jail, have her strip searched and then released as a mistake and that would be fine in your eyes. You must be a conservative.
So in your eyes the only women that would commit a crime are less than nice looking. Hmm. What would be in it for a police officer to arrest a “nice looking lady” take her to jail and not be allowed to witness the strip search???
Where do I say only less than beautiful women commit crimes? Like many on the right, you twist somebody’s words and then say stupid things.
How many times have you seen strip searches that were recorded? Because many of them are. Of course, the tapes are only viewed by those who have a need to, and are destroyed after the need is passed. And if you believe that one, I’ll also tell you that the FBI never abused people’s right to privacy, and NJ cops never racially profiled who they stopped.
http://www.aclu.org/racial-justice/aclu-new-jersey-files-turnpike-racial-profiling-lawsuit
You are the one who brought forth the idea that cops will arrest nice looking women just so that they can be strip searched.
How many strip searches havce I seen recorded? Short answer is NEVER. If you have evidence that there are camera crews recording strip searches in Maine, I and many others sure would be interested to know your source.
The rest of your rant is gibberish. Do you have a clue as to the makeup of New Jersey? Now if a cop stops someone for running a redlight in Newark, Camden, and a bunch of other towns. What are the odds of that person being black, hispanic, white, etc.
By the way, every time I’ve done one of those test to detrimine if you are a liberal or conservative. I have landed in the high liberal catagory.
It is hard to argue with people who don’t read well.
Let me start over.
The man who originated this case is from NJ. It is not a majority minority state. That means most of the people are not minority, even though the majority of people stopped (80% by some measures) were minority. This was the reason for the link, to show what NJ state police are capable of.
I never said the recording was going on in Maine, but I have watched enough tv to have seen lots of strip searches with the naughty bits pixelated. I would not be surprised if recordings were going on in ME. The cops want to be protected from some who might claim abuse.
Finally, because of this ruling, what is to stop cops for arresting somebody just because they want to oogle them? Cops have been convicted of raping people they stop, shaking down people they stop, brutalizing the ones they stop. But because you say so, you don’t think it is possible they will arrest somebody to strip them?
“I never said the recording was going on in Maine, but I have watched enough tv to have seen lots of strip searches with the naughty bits pixelated.”
There in a nutshell is the answer. You have watched plenty of TV. TV is not the real world.
This is a very bad and sad ruling for freedom.
Getting pretty sick of these clearly politicized rulings. These constant 5-4 decisions are telling.
Since 9/11, civil liberties have suffered. Another stellar 5-4 decision from the Supreme Court.
I have grown to expect radical rulings from the SC. With the five neocons on the court issuing rulings like this, that they know will never affect their one percent power sponsors, the hand on the lower classes gets heavier still.
viptoshopper.com
This is a prime example of Tea Party agenda.
Another tool for the government to terrorize us with.
Conservatives should be incensed at this egregious attack on personal liberty and privacy.
Instead, it is conservatives – acting through a partisan supreme court = that are championing this Stalin-like government assault on just cause and due process.
Show us your papers Comrade!
And while you’re at it….. bend over.
Thanks Tea Party.
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