Supreme Court Approves Strip Searches For Any Arrestable Offense 747
sl4shd0rk writes "Taking a page out of the TSA handbook, the Supreme Court has voted to allow strip searches for any offense, no matter how minimal. The article cites these two tidbits from Justice Anthony Kennedy: 'Every detainee who will be admitted to the general [jail or prison] population may be required to undergo a close visual inspection while undressed,' and 'Maintaining safety and order at detention centers requires the expertise of correctional officials.'"
This seems terrifying (Score:2, Interesting)
As a non American, can anybody explain to me why this isn't an utterly horrifying ruling? Can a police officer detain and strip search you if they see you jaywalking now?
I would rather have that than contraband (Score:5, Interesting)
I generally am pretty pro-civil rights, but if I were going into a jail or prison I would probably rather have someone strip search me than to get shanked later by some psycho who snuck in a knife. And it's also a pretty shitty message to send to guards to say "A minor issue of prisoner privacy is more important to us than your safety."
Maybe you can make the "slippery slope" argument on this, but some sort of strip search on prison admission is hardly a new issue. They've been doing it for decades now.
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:0, Interesting)
This is what I don't get. YES, the country SEEMS to be spiraling out of control, but is it really? How much has your life changed in the last ten to fifteen years? Is it better or worse? Mine is better. Much, much better.
Oh, and remember that this is the US, where we pride ourselves on being able to change the system. How about instead of fleeing, you contribute?
Re:This seems reasonable (Score:4, Interesting)
Not convicted, arrested. First, the bar is *a lot* lower to arrest someone than to convict them. Innocent people get arrested all the time. This also not only for prison, it's for jail. Jail is "I got drunk and maybe a little stupid so they tossed me in here overnight", jail is "I went to this protest, and the cops decided to take a few of us in", jail is "They don't even have enough to charge me, but they can hold me here for 24 hours". A significant percentage of people who go to jails in a large city never even get *charged* with anything, let alone convicted. I know guys who've spent a night or two in jail here or there who have security clearances. Given the number of years I lived in New Orleans, and the number of mildly stupid things I've done int eh French Quarter after a long nigh, I count myself pretty lucky not to spent a night or two there myself.
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:5, Interesting)
Still sound reasonable?
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:4, Interesting)
In your country it's been abuses by the Muslim groups - for instance, claiming anyone opposed to legalizing polygamy is engaging in "hate speech against the Koran."
See Also [wikipedia.org]...
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, there are lots of us who are going somewhere. My wife and I have already decided that as soon as my daughter is done with school we're moving to Montenegro. Got a little house in Sutomore, and we'll spend our summers in Belgrade or over here. When the five cunts on the Supreme Court made George Bush president in 2000, I started working on an Italian passport, which I got thanks to my ancestry and I can keep my US citizenship thanks to Jure Sanguinis (who I think is an Italian dude who I paid off to fix the whole thing for me).
Like the words of the song, "I'm going to a place that has already been burned down, I'm so tired of you, America."
With US citizenship and EU citizenship, I'll be able to come and go as I please and if things go really south over here, my daughter can come live with us. When I retired at age 50, I had the max into Social Security, so since it's solvent for the next 30 years, I'll probably collect for at least 20 years (assuming we're able to keep the Republicans away from it).
It's not that I hate America. I love this place, warts and all. But the election of 2000 was the first big sign that I noticed, and the fact that lynching is legal again in Florida is just one more straw on the camel. Can you imagine? More than 20 states have passed these "Stand Your Ground & Shoot a Black Guy" laws already, and if the American Legislative Exchange Council has it's way, it'll be coming soon to a state near me. Fuck that. With my guinea olive skin I would hate some cracker to mistake me for a brother when I'm out on a cold morning doing tai chi in the park with my hoodie up and put a few shots in my back because seeing a potential black guy doing tai chi was just too threatening for him.
Oh jeez, look at the time. I'm sorry I ran my mouth like this.
Re:This seems reasonable (Score:5, Interesting)
I got thrown in Jail in New Orleans for making an "illegal left hand turn between 12 and 4 PM". I was a bit earlier than normal on my driving route, my GF was griping on me, and I didn't notice.
Yes, I was as polite as can be to the cop who pulled me over. No, I had no other charges or warrants or anything. I had an out-of-state license, and that was enough.
So have fun with your police strip search next time your SO distracts you in traffic at the wrong time.
Intimidation (Score:4, Interesting)
So how long before we start to see roadside strip searches of Occupy protestors? And just last week we were criticizing Egypt for their "virginity testing", which in practical terms, is almost the same procedure as a cavity search in the US.
Re:I left and it's easy to do (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not in Denmark.
I moved to Stockholm originally and if you're in a technical field, you could get a job without Swedish. Surprisingly (or maybe not) most technical terms are in English. In addition, any Swede in a reasonable sized area is fluent in English. However, you'd have to bring something to the table that would make you interesting. Also, there were several work places that I knew of that functioned solely in English (multinational corps ... AstraZeneca for example.)
Copenhagen should be similar and this points system looks quite easy compared to the standard visa system for an American. You do need to meet the financial requirements though, which looks to be about 1000€ in savings/month duration of the initial permit.
I'm now in Germany and while English is very wide-spread, the willingness to employ it is much lower, therefore basic German is necessary, but can be picked-up in 6 months or so. Conversely, native English speakers have high value here (I know a few that just got hired as technical writers (with PhD).
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:4, Interesting)
Not hate speech, but copyright, and used to silence critics with lawsuits; http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2245&dat=19991016&id=C-g0AAAAIBAJ&sjid=NyEGAAAAIBAJ&pg=4294,5523199 [google.com]
Nothing against Mormons personally, and a primarily academic interest in copyright and the church. It just happened to be in my list of reading material.
Re:I left and it's easy to do (Score:5, Interesting)
Wow, are you uninformed! I work in Germany, for a corporation, and I also get 12 paid holidays, but unlike you I don't merely get a measly 4 weeks per year of paid vacation. I get 6, and from the first year I started working with at my company. I lived in the US for many years and so I know that hardly anyone who doesn't work for the government gets 4 weeks like you do. Here 6 weeks is quite common. I always pointed out a German saying to my American friends: "I don't live to work, I work to live." What's the point of making all that money if I have no time to enjoy it? I work to support housing, food, clothing etc. like everyone else, but beyond that I work so that I can support my hobbies and to spend time off with friends and family. American culture struck me as ass-backwards in that respect. People spending long hours at work. What's the point of life if that's how you have to live? Now, if you're close to starving I can understand doing that, but only if those hours are actually being paid, but otherwise I can't relate to that kind of mindset at all.
Re:Canada Here I Come (Score:4, Interesting)
SYG laws do not give you a right to randomly shoot people, regardless of their racial background; and you can't claim that you "felt threatened" and get off solely on the basis on that, contrary to what anti-gun propagandists have been saying. In Zimmerman's case, the problem is that the authorities are unwilling to enforce the law as written, and using their misinterpretation for it to cover up their desire to not prosecute (though that seems to have changed due to public criticism).