I am not sure if any of you have heard of this case or not, but I came across it while I was looking up cases for one of my activities and it caught my eye. In October 2003, a 13-year old girl, Savana Redding, was strip-searched for alledgedly possessing ibuprofen. At her school, Safford Middle School in Arizona, there is a zero-tolerance policy for all prescription and over-the-counter medication without prior written permission. One student was found with ibuprofen in her possession, so in order to avoid punishment, she accused Redding of providing it to her. Redding was an honor student and had no prior disciplinary problems. However, after finding nothing in her backpack, Redding was further searched by her school nurse and vice principal's assistant, both female. Redding was searched down to her underwear and bra. Still no drugs were found. After the incident, Redding and her family sued the school. The court said the school had gone to far. The school appealed to the high court. Arguments are expected to be heard in April.
Some of the psychological factors that come into play with this case is the potential traumatic effects it could have on Redding. In addition, this may cause Redding to have trust issues with authority. The psychological scenario of obedience to authority is also relevant in this case because Redding stripped when told. She chose to obey authority; however was authority correct in pushing Redding that far?
I thought this case related to our class in the sense that the strip-search could have been extremely traumatizing for Redding, especially for her age and its excessive intrusiveness. This also relates to our recent class discussion of discretion. The school applied its discretion in believing they had probable cause to strip-search Redding.
Posted below are a few links to articles I came across while researching the case
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/01/16/teen.strip.search/index.html
http://civilliberty.about.com/od/equalrights/p/Stafford-v-Redding-School-Strip-Search-Case.htm
While I can understand why school districts like to have more freedom when it comes to engaging in searches of students. The reasoning of course being that they need that authority to keep students safe. This is clearly a case of discretion gone insane. Strip searching a 13 year old over some Ibuprofen that you only have the word of someone trying to get of trouble to tell you it even exists. Honestly the only reason I think that the Supreme Court chose to listen to the school appeal was to clarify a bit of case law that they felt was not clear on the "don't strip search children over Ibuprofen" thing. Now if this situation had been about a weapon, or more dangerous drug then maybe I could see where the school was coming from. This would of course assume that they had more to go on then someone who is trying to save their own hide's word on it.
I suppose it goes without saying that finding people who side with the school on this are few and far between. I feel though that I should point out that schools do have less strict requirements on them to conduct searches. But unlike Justice Thomas the rest of the court here found that the school did not have enough to go on to conduct such an invasive search, and while I don't know if the court would agree I think that Ibuprofen isn't a good enough reason even if they did have enough to go on.
I understand the school wanting to keep a drug free policy and having Savana come into the Principal’s office and being asked about the allegation is an acceptable practice and even being questioned about the indecent multiple times is even okay. The school definably went over the line. To have a 13 year old girl strip down to her underwear and bar is embarrassing and degrading. All of this because another student was caught and said her name. The school had nothing more to go on then another student’s word. I don’t' care if she was being accused of possessing an illegal substance, they didn't have enough information or evidence to go on and they had not right to make her strip.
I'm glad this went to court, because I think some schools get away with doing things that maybe they shouldn't be doing. I also think that if the courts side with the school it's going to set a standard that schools can do whatever they think is necessary in order to keep their students "safe" and to enforce their rules.
Reading this story, it actually made me really mad. Seriously, its ibuprofen. I know that it said that kind of medication was illegal on their school grounds, but they asked her, and she denied having any, so why not take her word for it? Performing a strip search was going way beyond the schools' boundaries, and I don't think it was necessary at all. Searching her bag and locker? Ok, that's fine. But after not finding anything in those locations, why wouldn't you just let her go? It's not like she's performing an illegal drug deal of marijuanna or something, it's a pain reliever.
I'm really happy that Savana's family sued, they had every right to. I think the school will put up a good argument with saying that they wanted to keep their school safe and all that other stuff, but I hope the courts realize that doing a strip search was going a little over the top. I don't know if the high school that I went to allowed ibuprofen or not, but I do know that almost every student at my school had some in their locker or bags. Carrying ibuprofen really isn't a big deal, and I hope that justice is served in this case.