Tuesday, April 21, 2009

How About Zero Tolerance for Petty Tyrants and Asinine Decisions?

I heard a story today on the radio about a bunch of school administrators in Arizona who strip-searched Savana Redding -- a 13-year old girl. Apparently they thought she might be carrying a prescription 400mg ibuprofen tablet contrary to school regulations.

On the say-so of another student (the first of many loopy decisions) the assistant principal went thorough her backpack (finding nothing) and then took her to the nurse's office.

Redding readily agreed to have her backpack searched. When that didn't turn up anything, she was ordered to follow the secretary into the nurse's office.

Redding says she was then asked to strip down to her underwear and stood there while the nurse and secretary inspected her clothes and shoes.

"Then, you know, I thought they were going to let me put my clothes back on, but instead they asked me to pull out my bra and shake it, and the crotch on my underwear, too," Redding says.

Redding says her whole body was visible to the school administrators. She kept her head down so the nurse and the secretary couldn't see her fighting back tears

Really, guys? For a kilo of uncut heroin, I would make an exception but for the equivalent of 2 advil, (which they did not find) it seems like overkill.

What really amazes me is that the school administrators think this is a completely rational and normal way to behave.

Lawyer for the school system says: "We just have to ask ourselves, as a policy matter, do you really want a drug-free environment? And if you do, then there are going to be some privacy invasions when there is reason to suspect that those drugs are being dispensed on campus, that they're being used by students."

If their attitude is representative, its pretty clear we are raising a generation who are accustomed to being searched, surveilled and even stripped to their underwear by the 'authorities'.

How long will the 4th Ammendment last?

1 comments:

Atom Smasher said...

If I had kids there is no way in hell I would let them near the public school system, and if the above happened in a private school I'd take my money from them and switch to another so fast it would make their pinny heads spin.

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