AELE LAW LIBRARY OF CASE SUMMARIES:
Corrections Law for
Jails, Prisons and Detention Facilities
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Search: Body Cavity
A
female former inmate at a correctional facility claimed that three female
officers threw her to the ground, lifted her smock, and forcibly opened her
legs to allow a male officer to visually inspect her genitalia for mattress
cotton. A Fourth Amendment claim regarding this visual body cavity search could
go forward because the plaintiff retained a limited right to bodily privacy and
there were disputed issues of fact concerning whether the search took place and
the purported justification for it. There appeared to be no evidence that the
plaintiff was in such imminent danger of harming herself that the search had to
be conducted right away by the male officer at the scene. An Eighth Amendment
excessive force claim could also go forward. Harris v. Miller, #14-2957, 2016
U.S. App. Lexis 4701 (2nd Cir.).
A female former
inmate asserted privacy and other claims against New Jersey and correctional
officials and employees, asserting that without proper authorization they took
her from one place of confinement to another where they denied her clothing,
sanitary napkins, and potable water, as well as needed medications, and
subjected her to an unlawful body cavity search. They also allegedly required
her to go to the shower or otherwise be exposed while naked while male
employees and inmates were present. A federal appeals court found that she
failed to adequately show that the state Attorney General or Commissioner of
Corrections had adopted policies that led to the deprivation of her
constitutional rights or that one named correctional officer knew of these
violations. Claims against other, as yet unidentified, correctional employees
with respect to these alleged violations, however, could continue. Chavarriaga
v. NJ Dep't of Corrs., #14-2044, 2015 U.S. App. Lexis 19854 (3rd Cir.).
An African-American inmate claimed that four
correctional officers violated his constitutional rights during a visual body
cavity search when he returned to a correctional facility from a school. He
said that he was told to remove his clothes, lift his genitals, and bend over
and spread his buttocks. He further complained that the search took place in
front of other prisoners and in the view of a security camera, so that female
correctional officers observed the search via video. He also claimed that one
of the officers subjected his to a racial slur by calling him a
"monkey." A federal appeals court found the plaintiff failed to
establish that any of this conduct violated his clearly established
constitutional rights. Story v. Foote, #13-2834, 2015 U.S. App. Lexis 5719
(8th.).
A woman was arrested and charged with driving on
a license suspended for failure to pay a traffic ticket, She paid her ticket
and fines, but while waiting to be released later that same day from the city
jail, was ordered to undress and shower in the presence of a corrections
officer and two other female detainees. She was also subjected to a visual body
cavity search, being instructed to bend at the waist and spread her buttocks.
While bent over, despite the fact that there was no indication that she had
lice, the officer sprayed her all over her naked body, including into her anus,
with a delousing solution. A federal appeals court ruled that the complaint
plausibly alleged a Fourth Amendment violation in that the jail, rather than
using less invasive procedures, required pretrial detainees who were being
processed into the facility to undress in the presence of other detainees and
to have their naked genitals sprayed with delousing solution from a pressurized
metal canister. It could have, for instance, allowed such detainees to apply
the solution themselves. The appeals court rejected the trial court's ruling
that the issue raised in the case was precluded from being raised by the U.S.
Supreme Court's decision in Florence v. Bd. of Chosen Freeholders of Cnty. of
Burlington, #10-945, 132 S. Ct. 1510 (2012), upholding the constitutionality of
a blanket policy of strip searching incoming pretrial detainees absent
individualized suspicion that each detainee was concealing contraband. Williams
v. City of Cleveland, #13-4162, 771 F.3d 945 (6th Cir. 2014).
A man arrested for DUI admitted that he had
recently smoked marijuana and he was then subjected to a visual inspection body
cavity search at a detention center. In his lawsuit over the search, defendant
officers were entitled to qualified immunity. At the time of the strip search,
there was no clearly established law in the Eighth Circuit, and a reasonable
officer would have had a "solid belief" that strip searching an
arrestee was constitutional if there was reasonable suspicion that the detainee
possessed contraband. Jacobson v. McCormick, #12-3530, 763 F.3d 914 (8th Cir.
2014).
A jury verdict that a county jail did not violate
the rights of a man detained for civil contempt by subjecting him to an
invasive body cavity search was set aside by a federal trial court as against
the manifest weight of the evidence, when the detainee was not charged with any
crime, and deputies at the facility did not state that they had any suspicion
about the detainee which would justify the type of search conducted. A new
trial was therefore granted on the plaintiff's claim. Thompson v. County of
Cook, No. 03C7172, 428 F. Supp. 2d 807 (N.D. Ill. 2006). [N/R]
Strip search, including a digital rectal search,
of a prisoner who allegedly refused to cooperate and injured a guard in
resisting was reasonable and justified by a legitimate interest in maintaining
order and security. The prisoner's "conclusory" assertion that the
glove used to conduct the search was "dirty" was insufficient to show
that the search was conducted in an unsanitary manner in violation of the
Eighth Amendment. Green v. Hallam, No. 03-2562, 105 Fed. Appx. 858 (7th Cir.
2004). [N/R]
Inmate who completed only the first step of a
multi-step jail grievance procedure failed to satisfy the requirements of the
Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA), 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1997e, that he exhaust
available administrative remedies before filing his lawsuit seeking damages for
an allegedly unreasonable body cavity search. Morgan v. Maricopa County, 259 F.
Supp. 2d 985 (D. Ariz. 2003). [N/R]
Manual search of prisoner's rectal cavity for the
purposes of preventing drugs from entering an administrative segregation unit
did not violate his Fourth Amendment or Eighth Amendment rights when carried
out in prison infirmary's emergency room by medical personnel. Alleged
violation of prison regulation requiring the exhaustion of other search methods
first did not establish a constitutional violation. Wiley v. Serrano,
#00-55997, 37 Fed. Appx. 252, 2002 U.S. App. Lexis 9736 (9th Cir. 2002). [2002
JB Nov]
267:42 Texas
prisoner complaining that body cavity searches were used to sexually harass him
could not proceed as pauper in lawsuit or appeal of dismissal when he
previously filed four frivolous lawsuits and did not allege imminent danger of
serious physical harm at time of filing lawsuit or appeal. Banos v. O'Guin,
#97-40354, 144 F.3d 883 (5th Cir. 1998).
241:13 Jury
verdict that body cavity search was cruel and unusual punishment in violation
of the Eighth Amendment was "inconsistent" with its further finding
that prison guards were also entitled to qualified immunity; federal appeals
court orders further proceedings. Koch v. Ricketts, 82 F.3d 317 (9th Cir.
1996).
217:13 Digital
rectal probes of all prisoners transferred to institution's most secure area
was unconstitutional in the absence of "predicate cause" for
particular searches; defendant prison officials, however, were entitled to
qualified immunity from liability. Castillo v. Gardner, 854 F.Supp. 725 (E.D.
Wash. 1994).
221:75 Visual
body cavity searches, conducted on all prisoners, were justified by emergency
situation of increasing violence in prison; necessity for swift action
justified conducting search of group of prisoners in one location. Elliott v.
Lynn, 38 F.3d 188 (5th Cir. 1994).
[N/R] Digital
rectal search of prisoner was not cruel and unusual punishment; search was
based on legitimate objectives and was not conducted in an unnecessarily
brutal, painful or humiliating manner. Del Raine v. Williford, 32 F.3d 1024
(7th Cir. 1994).
Prison officials
were entitled to qualified immunity from liability for policy permitting
digital rectal probe searches on all inmates entering a secured area of the
prison; officials testified that they researched the legality of the searches
before implementing the policy. Hemphill v. Kincheloe, 987 F.2d 589 (9th Cir.
1993).
Visual body
cavity searches of prisoners before and after contact visits were reasonable
regardless of whether there was probable cause, when conducted to prevent
possession of weapons and contraband; possible violation of Wisconsin prison
regulation in conducting search was not a violation of constitutional rights.
Zunker v. Bertrand, 798 F.Supp. 1365 (E.D. Wis. 1992).
Prison policy of
random visual body cavity searches of inmates designed to prevent trafficking
in contraband was not unconstitutional. Covino v. Patrissi, 967 F.2d 73 (2nd
Cir. 1992). Digital rectal probe of prisoner prior to placement in unit housing
particularly violent offenders was rationally connected to a legitimate
interest in safety and order. Terrovona v. Brown, 783 F.Supp. 1281 (W.D. Wash.
1991).
Prison officials
were entitled to qualified immunity for conducting visual body cavity search of
male inmate in the presence of female correctional officers, based on
reasonable, even if mistaken, belief that an emergency existed. Cookish v.
Powell, 945 F.2d 441 (1st Cir. 1991).
Prison policy of
subjecting all prisoners transferred to intensive management unit to digital
rectal probes, absent probable cause for concealment of contraband, was
unconstitutional; prisoner subjected to search awarded $1 in nominal damages.
Wetmore v. Garner, 735 F.Supp. 974 (E.D. Wash. 1990).
Associate Warden
liable to inmate for $4,000 for digital anal body cavity search without
legitimate penological purpose. Hill v. Koon, 732 F.Supp. 1076 (D. Nev. 1990).