Settlement reached in York County jail strip-search lawsuit

PORTLAND – York County has agreed to pay $3.3 million and maintain a policy that gives York County Jail inmates more privacy when changing into uniforms to settle a class-action lawsuit that challenged strip searches at the jail, lawyers said Monday.

The agreement still needs to go before a federal judge for approval, which could happen as soon as next month.

If the agreement is approved, it will be one the largest civil rights settlements ever in Maine, according to David Webbert, an Augusta lawyer who represents the plaintiffs.

“This settlement is a complete victory. We have stopped a degrading and unnecessary practice that was going on for many years before we filed suit,” Webbert said.

The relatively large settlement also “sends an important message that the government must respect the civil rights of all citizens, even those who are in jail,” said Howard Friedman, a Boston attorney who also represents the plaintiffs.

A similar lawsuit against Knox County is pending in U.S. District Court in Portland. That case is scheduled for trial in April, but could be settled in mediation early next year.

Both suits claimed that jail personnel violated the law by requiring all people brought to the jails to strip and shower in front of an officer – no matter what charge was brought against them.

“The Knox County process was a bit more obnoxious than York County’s,” said Robert J. Stolt of Augusta, the plaintiff’s attorney in that case, said Monday. “In York, corrections officers were watching people change clothing. In the Knox County case, the officers were conducting strip and body cavity searches.”

Stolt said he expects the York County settlement to give “us some range” in damage discussions, but added that “we think it’s more significant” because the searches were more intrusive in Knox County.

The York County lawsuit was filed in 2002 by Michele Nilson of North Andover, Mass., who was arrested for driving with a suspended driver’s license in 1999 and forced to take off her clothes in front of a corrections officer when taken to the jail in Alfred.

The Knox County case was filed the same year by Laurie Tardiff of Thomaston. She was arrested on Feb. 7, 2001, in Rockland on a felony charge of tampering with a witness. She also was charged with violating conditions of release, a misdemeanor. Both charges were dismissed in September 2002.

Attorneys have estimated that as many as 7,500 people were illegally stripped at the York County Jail and could be eligible to receive part of the settlement. The actual amount that lawsuit members receive depends on how many people submit claim forms.

Stolt estimated Monday that 5,000 to 9,000 people could be considered plaintiffs in the Knox County case.

“The records in Knox County are not as good as York County’s computerized records,” he said. “It’s hard to identify accurate numbers from their [jail] records.”

The York County agreement stipulates that female members of the suit will get twice as much as men will receive because both sides agreed that women experience more humiliation than men when told to disrobe. The plaintiff’s attorneys are seeking 30 percent of the settlement fund, or $990,000.

Gene Libby, a Portland attorney who was one of the lawyers representing York County, said the county has agreed to maintain a new strip-search policy and to pay money, but it does not admit to wrongdoing.

The policy, which went into effect on April 30, calls for York County Jail inmates to undress down to their underwear in front of jail officers, then stand behind a privacy screen to finish disrobing and put on a jail uniform.

People arrested for violent felonies, drug offenses and weapons charges are still subject to full strip searches, Libby said.

U.S. District Judges D. Brock Hornby and Gene Carter last year certified the cases as a class action. People are eligible to be part of the York County settlement if they were arrested for crimes that did not involve drugs, weapons or violent felonies between Oct. 14, 1996, and April 30, 2004, and were forced to put on a jail uniform before their first court appearance.

NEWS writer Judy Harrison contributed to this report.