Congress, Enact Strict Limits on Strip-Searches

  • by: Susan V
  • recipient: US Congress

For years, women at Chicopee jail in Massachusetts were videotaped being stripped-searched - by men. Although a federal trial court in MA finally ruled this to be “plainly unconstitutional,” neither it nor the US Supreme Court has held that these demeaning strip searches, without a proper warrant, are unconstitutional altogether.

In fact the Supremes ruled last year that strip searches of incoming detainees may be allowed - even for minor offences.

The use of strip searching, itself, on women at Chicopee who were being segregated because of mental illness or sexual abuse was more than just humiliating, says one plaintiff in a class-action suit against MA Department of Corrections. It worsened their trauma.

Then imagine having a man videotape you while you were being sexually abused all over again, she added.

In its decision on strip-searches, the Supreme Court has lost sight of human rights and Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches. Tell Congress to enact strict laws against unwarrented strip-searches.

We, the undersigned, say the US Supreme Court failed US Citizens in its ruling on strip-searches.

This issue came before the nation’s highest court after a man was forced to expose his genitals and undergo further humiliating and traumatizing procedures after a traffic stop exposed an unpaid fine.

Even though the Court ruled that it was not “always reasonable to conduct a full strip search of an arrestee whose detention has not been reviewed by a judicial officer..” it pretty much leaves this up to the discretion of the officer or the facility.

And, according to Naomi Wolf, this is just an invitation for abuse, especially of women. She sees it as a “determination to intrude on citizens sexually,” and a retrogressive practice that is part of our nation’s shameful history. “Forcing people to undress is the first step in breaking down their sense of individuality and dignity and reinforcing their powerlessness, “ Wolf elaborates.

Enslaved women were sold naked on the blocks in the American south, and adolescent male slaves served young white ladies at table in the south, while they themselves were naked: their invisible humiliation was a trope for their emasculation. Jewish prisoners herded into concentration camps were stripped of clothing and photographed naked, as iconic images of that Holocaust reiterated.

Currently where any concern about “safety” issues can lead to innocent Americans being arrested for just about any reason, the added threat of sexual humiliation is beyond acceptable.

We ask Congress to pass a law making unwarranted strip-searches illegal everywhere.







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