Strip searching for ibuprofen

Ibuprofen is one thing. Crack cocaine is another. School authorities in Safford, Arizona didn't seem to understand the difference, or that a person suspecting of carrying ibuprofen should be treated less harshly than one suspected of carrying crack cocaine.

Savana Redding was 13 years old at the time. For some reason she was suspected of being a dangerous druggie, perhaps having "prescription-strength" ibuprofen somewhere on her person, maybe hidden in her genitals. Thus she was strip-searched in the school nurse's office.

Joshua Holland writes: "She was made to expose her breasts and pubic area to prove she was not hiding pills."


That was six years ago. Savana's mother didn't take kindly to this action and sued, beginning a legal battle which is now headed to the United States Supreme Court!


One cannot help but wonder how such morons get to be in charge of a public school in this country or how they stay in positions of authority. Actually, in my experience in the education system, I found there are many morons in charge of our public schools. I'm not sure why that's the case, except that quite often people who can't teach or don't like kids end up being administrators; and not a few of the people elected to school boards are dumber than doorknobs with political agendas that do not include the welfare of the children for which they are responsible.

Holland refers to a 1985 Supreme Court decision which held that school poohbahs can search a student if they have "reasonable suspicion" of some dirty deed, but warned that a search should not be "exessively intrusive" and take into account "the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction."

Holland concludes:

"Aside from the fact that this case certainly appears to be 'excessively intrusive' -- remember we're talking about ibuprofen, not smack -- it's also in keeping with the slow erosions [sic] of our liberties. The 5th Amendment to the Constitution doesn't say 'persons who aren't students in a school' shall not be 'deprived of life, liberty or process without due process of law,' is just says 'persons.' Last I checked, school kids are persons too."


I agree. But I would add the caveat that when one person in our country is deprived of his/her constitutional rights by some blowhard moron in a position of authority, all of us are at risk.


Read the entire article here.