High court upholds jailhouse strip searches(edited)

So much for conservative values from our uber right wing 5 in the SCOTUS.




This is where libertarians and I get along just fine in agreeing that the GOP believes that privacy is not a value of any kind for Americans because Republicans are too scared and IMO, this makes them too scared to run the country.

Ben Franklin was right. We gotta get these activist cowards out of the Judicial system. They always side with authority over the people.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

First, Franklin's quote has nothing to do with this case. He was referring to laws that restrict freedom to gain security.

Second, this guy was accused of a violation and arrested. His strip search was part of the effort of the guards to prevent dangerous weapons, drugs and other contraband from entering the prison system. The fact that he was wrongly accused does not negate the need to keep contraband from the prison population.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

ksu_aviator said:

First, Franklin's quote has nothing to do with this case. He was referring to laws that restrict freedom to gain security.

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Which is exactly what this ruling is about.

ksu_aviator said:

Second, this guy was accused of a violation and arrested. His strip search was part of the effort of the guards to prevent dangerous weapons, drugs and other contraband from entering the prison system. The fact that he was wrongly accused does not negate the need to keep contraband from the prison population.

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I see, all "accused" right or wrong are subject to whatever perversions the authority throws at them. You keep putting your faith in authority. I'll keep my faith with the people.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

So much for conservative values from our uber right wing 5 in the SCOTUS.

High court upholds jailhouse strip searches

In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled against a New Jersey man who was strip searched in two county jails following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine that he had, in reality, paid.

The decision resolved a conflict among lower courts about how to balance security and privacy. Prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, lower courts generally prohibited routine strip searches for minor offenses. In recent years, however, courts have allowed jailers more discretion to maintain security, and the high court ruling ratified those decisions.

In this case, Albert Florence's nightmare began when the sport utility vehicle driven by his pregnant wife was pulled over for speeding. He was a passenger; his 4-year-old son was in the backseat.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said the circumstances of the arrest were of little importance. Instead, Kennedy said, Florence's entry into the general jail population gave guards the authorization to force him to strip naked and expose his mouth, nose, ears and genitals to a visual search in case he was hiding anything.​

This is where libertarians and I get along just fine in agreeing that the GOP believes that privacy is not a value of any kind for Americans because Republicans are too scared and IMO, this makes them too scared to run the country.

Ben Franklin was right. We gotta get these activist cowards out of the Judicial system. They always side with authority over the people.

​

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How did you tie SCOTUS to Republicans again? I missed that part.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

I happen to agree with this SCOTUS decision. Once you enter into the jail population, it's in the interest not only of the State, the employees of the State but also of other inmates that a person be checked ... including a strip search. That it happened in a case where it didn't need to happen, is irrelevant. Justice Kennedy had it exactly right.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

So much for conservative values from our uber right wing 5 in the SCOTUS.

High court upholds jailhouse strip searches

In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled against a New Jersey man who was strip searched in two county jails following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine that he had, in reality, paid.

The decision resolved a conflict among lower courts about how to balance security and privacy. Prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, lower courts generally prohibited routine strip searches for minor offenses. In recent years, however, courts have allowed jailers more discretion to maintain security, and the high court ruling ratified those decisions.

In this case, Albert Florence's nightmare began when the sport utility vehicle driven by his pregnant wife was pulled over for speeding. He was a passenger; his 4-year-old son was in the backseat.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said the circumstances of the arrest were of little importance. Instead, Kennedy said, Florence's entry into the general jail population gave guards the authorization to force him to strip naked and expose his mouth, nose, ears and genitals to a visual search in case he was hiding anything.​

This is where libertarians and I get along just fine in agreeing that the GOP believes that privacy is not a value of any kind for Americans because Republicans are too scared and IMO, this makes them too scared to run the country.

Ben Franklin was right. We gotta get these activist cowards out of the Judicial system. They always side with authority over the people.

​

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While I don't disagree with you philosophically, you are misstating what the decision was about:

Florence's entry into the general jail population gave guards the authorization to force him to strip naked and expose his mouth, nose, ears and genitals to a visual search in case he was hiding anything.

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You may not agree with this, but it doesn't have anything to do with "fear." It doesn't have anything to do with 9/11 or terrorism or anything regarding public safety at all. It's about ensuring safety (of the guards and other inmates) inside a prison.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

"Upholds" being the key term, these types of procedures have happened frequently in the last decade, I'm assuming that they felt no need to overturn previously ratified legislation over a single isolated incident. Do I agree with them? Not at all, but their reasoning isn't too outlandish.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Harshaw said:

While I don't disagree with you philosophically, you are misstating what the decision was about:



You may not agree with this, but it doesn't have anything to do with "fear." It doesn't have anything to do with 9/11 or terrorism or anything regarding public safety at all. It's about ensuring safety (of the guards and other inmates) inside a prison.

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It's my contention that fear is the general basis of why a ruling sides with authority over the people.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Hare said:

"Upholds" being the key term, these types of procedures have happened frequently in the last decade, I'm assuming that they felt no need to overturn previously ratified legislation over a single isolated incident.

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Until it happens to you I'm sure you'll feel that way. I'd rather stand for something when its wrong even BEFORE it happens to me.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

It's my contention that fear is the general basis of why a ruling sides with authority over the people.

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It's not "the people." It's inside a prison. You do know that inmates have severely-restricted rights, yes?

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

American said:

How did you tie SCOTUS to Republicans again? I missed that part.

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Sorry. Not going to educate you on who appointed the SCOTUS' and how their rulings have been rather consistently partisan.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Harshaw said:

It's not "the people." It's inside a prison. You do know that inmates have severely-restricted rights, yes?

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I acknowledge that. And I think its a jail not a prison and when you are arrested and jailed, you are detained, not guilty because your day in court hasn't happened yet.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

I acknowledge that. And I think its a jail not a prison and when you are arrested and jailed, you are detained, not guilty because your day in court hasn't happened yet.

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Either way, it's inside a prison; the same rules apply.

Look, I may even disagree with the decision, but you're making it out to be something other than what it is.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Ya know after spending a couple of days in the hotel Lew Sterwart (Dallas County Jail) I'm glad many of the characters in there were stripped search.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

So much for conservative values from our uber right wing 5 in the SCOTUS.

High court upholds jailhouse strip searches

In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled against a New Jersey man who was strip searched in two county jails following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine that he had, in reality, paid.

The decision resolved a conflict among lower courts about how to balance security and privacy. Prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, lower courts generally prohibited routine strip searches for minor offenses. In recent years, however, courts have allowed jailers more discretion to maintain security, and the high court ruling ratified those decisions.

In this case, Albert Florence's nightmare began when the sport utility vehicle driven by his pregnant wife was pulled over for speeding. He was a passenger; his 4-year-old son was in the backseat.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said the circumstances of the arrest were of little importance. Instead, Kennedy said, Florence's entry into the general jail population gave guards the authorization to force him to strip naked and expose his mouth, nose, ears and genitals to a visual search in case he was hiding anything.​

This is where libertarians and I get along just fine in agreeing that the GOP believes that privacy is not a value of any kind for Americans because Republicans are too scared and IMO, this makes them too scared to run the country.

Ben Franklin was right. We gotta get these activist cowards out of the Judicial system. They always side with authority over the people.

​

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I'm going to assume you don't know much of anything about law enforcement, jails and suchlike, because it certainly seems to be the case. I'm not belittling you, most people don't.

The fact is that once you're in the jail, in custody, for whatever reason, the jail authorities are responsible for you. They're also responsible for the safety of other inmates, of staff and guards, and potentially of courtroom staff and lawyers and judges when you're transported to court, and so forth and so on.... also for maintaining order within the jail.

Have you ever patted someone down or been patted down? Most people, even most cops, totally suck at pat-down searches. I could sneak a 12 gauge past an average pat-down. Even a technically-perfect pat-down search can easily miss well-hidden items.

Whenever I took custody of someone I patted them down again, even with some other officer telling me "oh it is fine I just patted him down and he's clean." Do you know what I've found that way? Bags of drugs. Knives. Brass knuckles. Cigarette lighters. Once, a small pistol. Some of these dingbats would have put guys in the back seat of the cruiser behind them in possession of items that could easily be a danger to the cop, the perp, or another person in custody.

Small contraband items can be hidden so throughly that NO Pat down will ever find them.

I always hated doing strip searches. One of the reasons I hated doing them was because the subject of the search would almost always get very uncomfortable, and some of them looked like they were going to blow a fuse and do something stupid. So I always talked to them in mild tones and explained carefully what the proceedure was, and that if they cooperated that at no time would I be putting my hands on them at all.

What I have a found in strip searches that pat-downs missed? Bags of weed, bags of coke, small containers of pills, small knives, razor blades, other things.

Most cops do not like doing strip searches any more than I did, but we recognize the necessity in a custodial situation for everyone's safety.


If your brother/sister/etc spent the night in jail for some minor public disorderly thing, and got shanked because staff didn't strip-search the drug dealer they brought in right after him/her, you'd probably be suing somebody right?

Just some things to bear in mind.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Age, young or old, should not affect, the decisions to subdue and cuff depending on their actions

Taking one into custody, they get cuffed and searched. Period.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

with our current prison / jail overcrowding issues, no one should be going to jail for an unpaid fine.

if we want to throw people in jail for unpaid fines, we're going to have to build more jails. the jails right now have offenders packed in like sardines. it's no surprise that they have to strip search everyone.

we truly need to re-examine the entire system and make some serious changes.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

Which is exactly what this ruling is about.



I see, all "accused" right or wrong are subject to whatever perversions the authority throws at them. You keep putting your faith in authority. I'll keep my faith with the people.

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So you think that people entering prisons should be allowed to bring weapons and drugs and other contraband in with them? Or do you think that people who have violated the law should be left to the honor system regarding weapons and drugs?

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

muciti said:

So you think that people entering prisons should be allowed to bring weapons and drugs and other contraband in with them?

Or do you think that people who have violated the law should be left to the honor system regarding weapons and drugs?

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Extremely stupid straw man there. I never said anything like that at all. Jail =/= prison. One is for guilty people and one is for detaining people who were recently arrested. This person was wrongfully detained for not paying parking tickets, when he had paid them, and stripped searched. Ridiculous.

Let's see how supportive people are of this when some punk-assed 20 year old starts pulling pretty mothers and daughters over and books them for a peak. You have far too much trust in authority. But you are a modern conservative so always siding with authority is to be expected.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

Extremely stupid straw man there. I never said anything like that at all. Jail =/= prison. One is for guilty people and one is for detaining people who were recently arrested. This person was wrongfully detained for not paying parking tickets, when he had paid them, and stripped searched. Ridiculous.

Let's see how supportive people are of this when some punk-assed 20 year old starts pulling pretty mothers and daughters over and books them for a peak. You have far too much trust in authority. But you are a modern conservative so always siding with authority is to be expected.

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Do you think police are capable of pulling people off the streets, bringing them to jail, and strip searching them without having to actually tell someone about and for what reason they're doing it?

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

Republic Now! said:

Do you think police are capable of pulling people off the streets, bringing them to jail, and strip searching them without having to actually tell someone about and for what reason they're doing it?

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That's kind of what this lawsuit was about.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

That's kind of what this lawsuit was about.

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So you do believe that?

In which case you're mistaken. A policeman who pulls people off the street to "get a peek" isn't going to be a police officer long, and will most likely be getting peeked at themselves afterwords.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

So much for conservative values from our uber right wing 5 in the SCOTUS.

High court upholds jailhouse strip searches

In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled against a New Jersey man who was strip searched in two county jails following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine that he had, in reality, paid.

The decision resolved a conflict among lower courts about how to balance security and privacy. Prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, lower courts generally prohibited routine strip searches for minor offenses. In recent years, however, courts have allowed jailers more discretion to maintain security, and the high court ruling ratified those decisions.

In this case, Albert Florence's nightmare began when the sport utility vehicle driven by his pregnant wife was pulled over for speeding. He was a passenger; his 4-year-old son was in the backseat.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said the circumstances of the arrest were of little importance. Instead, Kennedy said, Florence's entry into the general jail population gave guards the authorization to force him to strip naked and expose his mouth, nose, ears and genitals to a visual search in case he was hiding anything.​

This is where libertarians and I get along just fine in agreeing that the GOP believes that privacy is not a value of any kind for Americans because Republicans are too scared and IMO, this makes them too scared to run the country.

Ben Franklin was right. We gotta get these activist cowards out of the Judicial system. They always side with authority over the people.

​

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I agree with the court's ruling. Whenever anyone is under arrest and entering into the general prison/jail population, the idea that they should not be strip-searched to make sure they don't have drugs or weapons is too risky.

Maybe what he should have (perhaps rightly) protested is the idea that he would be locked up in jail for a warrant issued for a ticket he'd already paid. That? I'd be on his side.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

poweRob said:

Which is exactly what this ruling is about.



I see, all "accused" right or wrong are subject to whatever perversions the authority throws at them. You keep putting your faith in authority. I'll keep my faith with the people.

Click to expand...

With all due respect, once someone enters the jail system, he belongs to the jailers. It is routine for jail guards to do strip searches in order to prevent contraband from running amok. When I was convicted of my DWI, I had to do 3 days in the Harris County Jail. I was strip searched twice during my short stay there, and also drug tested once. I respect the constitution, but once you are in jail, you abide by THEIR rules, which I feel are Constitutional. Now if a guard bangs someone's head against a wall, or otherwise roughs him up, then he has violated a prisoner's constitutional rights. But a strip search is lawful, and of course is done for a reasonable purpose, which makes it lawful.

Here's the deal. If the prisoner doesn't want to get caught with dope inside a jail, he shouldn't bring dope to the jail. Simple as that. Turns out that it's the prisoner who is the dope in this case.

Re: Fear rules the right wing SCOTUS

i've been arrested .. oh, i dunno... 24 times i think.. maybe 25... possibly 26.... a whole bunch of times is the point.

not once while I was in custody in the jailhouse was I not subjected to a strip search.

only one of my charges was serious... the rest were minor bull**** (this was back when bar-fights didn't screw you up for the rest of your life. and neither did getting **** faced falling down drunk).


I understand why I was searched, and to be honest, i'm glad everyone was searched.

sure, it's uncomfortable... well not for me, but for the poor cop who probably isn't paid enough to look as brown-eyes and nutsacks all days long... but it is necessary.

you want to see fear.. check out the face of some young suburban kid getting arrested for something stupid.. check out how he acts when he's in a holding cell with some badass hombres.... the only thing keeping him from pissing his pants is that his bladder is froze up in fear too.
you really don't want this kid in a cell with some gangbangers that are kiestering shanks



so, yeah, i got nothing negative to say about strip searches after you get thrown in to jail... they are necessary...

if we were talking about searching before you are in custody, well, we'd have an entirely different conversation on our hands. ( remember, first comes detention, then arrest, then custody... your rights change with each step)