Thousands strip-searched by Broward (FL) deputies to be paid in $11.5 Million settlement

[seafan]

Son of a @!#%&



Thousands strip-searched by Broward deputies to be paid in settlement

By John Holland
South Florida Sun-Sentinel

April 26, 2008

Thousands of trespassers, drunken people and others strip-searched at the Broward County Jail, though they were charged with only minor offenses, are entitled to $1,000 each as part of a multimillion-dollar settlement reached Friday.
The payout stems from former Sheriff Ken Jenne's controversial — and ultimately revoked — policy ordering strip searches for men and women charged with "a traffic, regulatory or misdemeanor offense."

Jenne maintained the search practice in written department policy from 1998 to 2001, but some jail deputies continued it sporadically for years afterward, according to court records. In each case, those arrested were made to take their clothes off and were examined by jailers, the lawsuit said.
The settlement caps a six-year legal battle led by lawyers for Martha Echeverry, of Pembroke Pines, and Daisy Cole, of Plantation. Each woman received $50,000 as a lead plaintiff because they participated in extensive court hearings and depositions.

.....

Cole was strip-searched three times in the 12 hours she was held in the jail after being charged with obstructing justice without violence. A judge withheld adjudication on the misdemeanor charge and sentenced her to alcohol rehabilitation.
Prosecutors never charged Echeverry with a crime after police arrested her in a domestic dispute.
"It was very belittling and I wanted to make sure that this wouldn't happen again," Cole said Friday. "Would you like it if deputies kept telling you to take your clothes off?"

Jenne is in federal prison after pleading guilty last year to public corruption charges.

Although lawyers for the plaintiffs and the Sheriff's Office said it's an $11.5 million settlement, the actual award is almost certain to be much lower, according to estimates by both sides.

.....

Approximately 5,000 people are expected to claim their shares of the settlement, which is capped at $1,000 a person.

.....

Broward Sheriff's Office Attorney Richard Beauchamp said the department did not admit any wrongdoing. That troubled Streitfeld, who questioned why the settlement didn't explicitly prohibit strip-searches in the future.

Richman said there was no need.

"We didn't think it was necessary, Judge, because appellate courts here and around the country have since made it clear that these type of searches without probable cause are illegal," Richman said. "Broward County would be very foolish to do something like this again."

[orleans]

1. ugh. at least they're getting something.

what's up with broward? what a bunch of fucking pervs

[sasquatch]

2. "Jenne is in federal prison after pleading guilty last year to public corruption charges. "

I hope he gets shanked the little Hitler.

[aquart]

3. Can they also be allowed to strip search the deputies?

In a public place?

[bushmeister0]

4. Bend over America: Philly has the same problem: 60k searched

Rudy Guiliani:

"Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do."

In a large series of articles in the Inquirer . . . Mark Faziollah reports on various police agencies in the Greater Philadelphia area that regularly strip-search every citizen they arrest, regardless of whether there is any probable cause for such an invasive search.

Although these searches are totally illegal, up until this past October, the city of Philadelphia had continued to make people arrested for the most trivial reasons strip, bend over and cough. For this reason, the sixth poorest city in the United States, with an obscene murder rate to boot, is facing paying out millions of dollars in law suits:

The Inquirer: 'Lawyers for the inmates, fresh from securing a $7.5 million settlement agreement in a similar suit in Camden, say as many as 60,000 Philadelphia inmates were wrongfully strip-searched during the last three years. They are seeking $15 million. The city called the number 'patently unreasonable' because Philadelphia was 'struggling to maintain basic services to taxpayers ,' and argued that the number of people illegally strip-searched was no more than 20,000."

The Inquirer:

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/local/20071213_Stripped_of_their_rights.html

[sasquatch]

5. Kick

:kick:

[Trillo]

6. And the proles get another few crumbs,

$1000 each. It might make all of one month's rent.