Suetaz

Illegal school searches

Toledo Blade | June 22, 2004 | Editorial

IT APPEARS several Detroit public high schools committed a fascist faux pas by allowing their students to be lined up like criminals in the hallways and frisked by police and security officers. The searches, conducted in at least four schools, were reportedly not instigated by any known or suspected criminal activity. They were just a random pat-down for possible contraband like drugs or guns.
At Mumford High School a search of about 1,800 students turned up no such items.

It is not surprising that the offensive sweeps have resulted in a federal lawsuit against the city, school system, and individual police and security officers. The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit on behalf of three students who say they were frisked and their pockets, purses, and other personal belongings searched without justification.

One student who objected to the mass inspection was arrested for disorderly conduct, according to the ACLU of Michigan. Its complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit, accused the school district of periodically conducting mass searches for guns or drugs "not based on suspected lawbreaking by any one student or group." The civil liberties group says such baseless sweeps are unconstitutional.

"These kinds of policies turn our schoolhouses into jailhouses," agreed Detroit attorney Amos Williams, who joined the ACLU in filing suit. Besides declaring the school searches unconstitutional, the plaintiffs also seek unspecified damages and a ban on future police pat-downs.

And well they should. Because while school security is an ongoing challenge in many urban areas and current protective measures including metal detectors and the presence of police and security officers in buildings are not foolproof, subjecting students to degrading frisks and indiscriminate searches is unacceptable.

"Once you open this door," said ACLU executive director Kary Moss, "it's very hard to close."

Neither the Detroit Public Schools nor the city has had much to say about the sweeps that, besides Mumford, were also held this year at Murray-Wright, Pershing, and Redford high schools. But soon enough they'll have to answer to the court for introducing students to the face of fascism as they were lined up in droves to be frisked and searched by police.

The ACLU has a good case to argue that the random sweeps policy in Detroit schools is a flawed way to achieve a worthy intent: to protect students against violence.


[Suetaznote: I think this is excellent news that the ACLU has taken up the fight in this. If they win this lawsuit it will set a very important precendent for future lawsuits. The war on drugs should not be a war on children. Law enforcement with guns, searching and frisking children looks like they are teaching children what 'police state' means, to me. Is this how we want our future generations raised, to learn to live in fear?]

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