That's right. It's officially OK to force 13-year-old girls to get naked if you suspect they might have OTC headache medicine.
Safford Middle School officials did not violate the civil rights of a 13-year-old Safford girl when they forced her to disrobe and expose her breasts and pubic area four years ago while looking for a drug, according to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling.
The justices voted 2-1 in favor of the Safford School District on Sept. 21. The decision upheld a federal district court's summary judgement that Safford Middle School Vice Principal Kerry Wilson, school nurse Peggy Schwallier and administrative assistant Helen Romero did not violate the girl's Fourth Amendment rights on Oct. 8, 2003, when they subjected her to a strip search in an effort to find Ibuprofen, an anti-inflammatory drug sold over the counter and in prescription strengths.
Consider this: if someone had discovered this girl stripping willingly (say, for her boyfriend), there'd be an outrage, she'd be expelled, and it's possible that one or both of them would be branded a sex offender. But apparently it's all right to force her to bare herself in front of school officials, as long as you can get two other students to claim she was handing out ibuprofen. Because apparently alleviating headaches without the school board's permission is such a dangerous threat that it justifies behavior that would normally be considered rape.
Update (6/25/09): This has now been overturned by the Supreme Court.
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