Prison Conditions
September 09, 2005
In affirming a 1983/SDP jury verdict in favor of a pretrial detainee, the panel recounts these facts:
[I]nmates on three-day rotation were subjected to as many as five in-cell strip searches each day. The process required the inmate to manipulate several unclean areas of his body in order to show officers that those areas did not conceal contraband. The inmate then had to place his fingers in his mouth for the same purpose. The evidence indicated that the strip searchers often orchestrated these steps so that an inmate would have to manipulate his armpits, groin, and buttocks before manipulating his cheeks and tongue. Because of the in-cell water restrictions, an inmate ordinarily could not wash his hands prior to such a search. Not infrequently, a strip-searched inmate would have to eat his meals with the same unclean hands.
Surprenant v. Rivas, No. 04-2285 slip op. at 5 (1st Cir. Sept. 9, 2005) (Thanks S.Cotus).