Judge: Strip-search settlement flawed Men, women should get equal payment

PORTLAND – A federal judge on Thursday disapproved a $3.3 million settlement of a class-action lawsuit because it proposed awarding twice as much in damages to women who were strip-searched at the York County Jail as it did to men.

The settlement had proposed paying $2,800 to each woman who had been strip-searched at the jail, while men would get $1,400 each.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers had argued that the double payment was justified because women have a legally recognized privacy interest in their upper bodies, and experienced two searches that prolonged and caused additional humiliation and emotional distress.

In a 30-page ruling, U.S. District Judge D. Brock Hornby said he could not approve double payment to women because it doesn’t pass constitutional muster. Hornby approved the rest of the settlement, which is one of Maine’s largest civil rights settlements ever.

“Individuals obviously differ in their sensitivity to physical privacy intrusions, but it is an overbroad generalization to conclude that women suffer twice as much emotional or legal injury as men do in a strip search,” Hornby wrote.

The settlement is the result of a lawsuit filed in 2002 by Michele Nilsen of North Andover, Mass., who was arrested in 1999 in Ogunquit on a charge of driving with a suspended license. In the lawsuit, Nilsen claimed that the York County Sheriff’s Department broke the law by requiring all people brought to the jail to strip and shower in front of an officer – no matter how minor the charge brought against them.

As part of the settlement, the county agreed to change its search policy by having detainees change into jail uniforms behind an opaque glass screen. People arrested for violent felonies, drug offenses and weapons charges are still subject to full strip searches.

The county also agreed to pay money to the class members, but did not acknowledge any pattern of constitutional violations.

At a hearing earlier this month, Hornby heard the final settlement arrangements that included paying approximately 1,350 class action members.

David Webbert, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said it’s an “easy fix” to recalculate the settlement to equalize the payments to men and women. If that happens, each member of the suit would get $1,670, he said.

Peter Marchesi, an attorney for the defendants, said he will discuss Hornby’s ruling with his clients, but that it seems realistic that the settlement will be amended to equalize the payment amounts.