California administrators advise volunteers to line up early.
Posted on 04/21/2009 1:42:40 PM PDT by zaphod3000
The Supreme Court gave a skeptical hearing today to lawyers who were urging a rule against strip searching students at school.
Instead, most of the justices voiced concern that students could hide dangerous drugs.....in their clothes.
SNIP
Last year, a U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the strip search of Savana Redding was unreasonable and unconstitutional since the pills were ibuprofen. And the court held that the school officials who ordered the search were liable for damages.
But in their comments and questions, most of the justices signaled they are inclined to overturn that decision.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said the school officials should be shielded from being sued since the law governing school searches had not been clear....
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, though a swing vote on many issues, has voted regularly to give police and school officials greater leeway to search for drugs.
SNIP
[Kennedy] objected when Adam Wolf, an ACLU lawyer for Redding, argued that the strip search was unreasonable because there was no evidence she was hiding anything in her underwear.
"Is the nature of drug irrelevant?" he asked. "What if it was meth to be consumed at noon?"
Wolf insisted that....school officials would not have reasonable grounds for strip searching a 13-year-old honors student. There was no reason to think she had pills in her underwear, he said.
SNIP
A lawyer for the Safford Unified School District urged the justices to rule that school officials have broad authority to search students. ......"[H]e was entitled to search any place where contraband might reasonably be found," said Matthew Wright, district's lawyer.
What about a "body cavity search?" asked Justice Antonin Scalia.
Wright replied that no school official would undertake such a search, but he insisted it would be legal.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Does that count as extra credit?
He can relate to this one ~ probably makes his trigger finger itchy.
California administrators advise volunteers to line up early.
Oh, yeah, this is a great case ~ and you just know Ruthy wished she'd been there to sort of check things out.
Are our schools prisons?
Well, let’s see, they have armed guards, set routine, cameras, and metal detectors. The answer is yes.
“It’s the seriousness of the charges” argues liberals.
They are advocating little girls getting probed by men looking for meth.
Actually its conservative judges arguing that position.
Don’t let this fall through the crack.
Actually, it’s both. Breyer and Souter asked similar questions.
That anyone would find it acceptable to strip search a child for a couple advils really disturbs me.
I’d be careful about drawing too many conclusions based only on the questions asked by the justices. It’s not necessarily a good indicator of how they’ll be voting.
Sometimes they ask questions against their own opinion, just to play devil’s advocate and to test their own arguments. Sometimes they don’t.
It’s an interesting case. Police of course can’t do warrantless searches— but parents can. Whether schools can... my gut says no they shouldn’t. But there’s an argument that schools also operate In Loco Parentis, that might carry some weight in certain circumstances. It’ll be interesting to read the opinions when they come out.
No more telling illustration of the Court?s mood emerged than Justice David H. Souter ? whose vote would almost have to be won for student privacy to prevail ? expressing a preference for ?a sliding scale of risk? that would add to search authority ? including strip searching ? based on how school officials assessed whether ?sickness or death? was at stake.?If the school official?s thought process,? Souter asked, ?was ?I?d rather have a kid embarrassed rather than some other kid dead,? isn?t that reasonable under the Fourth Amendment?? Stated in that stark way almost compelled agreement, without regard to whether a student singled out for a strip search was actually adding to such a risk, but was only the target of a classmate?s unverified tip.Along with Souter, two other Justices whose votes might turn out to be crucial ? Stephen G. Breyer and Anthony M. Kennedy ? were plainly more concerned about the drug problem than with student privacy. Both of those Justices, in past cases involving students and suspected drug use, have suggested that students? rights were not very sturdy.
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/analysis-a-fear-may-drive-a-decision/
They have to keep the right of searching students intact. It was a mistake to strip the kid without her parents, but go right ahead and search my son. We are finally getting our son under some control. If the school wants to search, go ahead.
IT’S ALL ABOUT *ZERO* TOLERANCE.
(then there’s that strip search thingy.)
I am surprised these school officials were not charged with pedophilia....there is no need to strip search a kid for ibuprofen
It would also be the very last such 'legal search' that particular School Official would ever perform.
L
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