On March 31, 2011, female prisoners at an Illinois women’s prison were strip searched as part of a training exercise for new guards. Several of the prisoners filed this putative class action in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of Illinois. The plaintiffs sued the Illinois Department of Corrections, Lincoln Correctional Center, and Logan Correctional Center under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Represented by civil rights attorneys Loevy and Loevy, they sought damages, costs and attorney’s fees, punitive damages, and injunctive relief. The complaint alleged that the strip searches were conducted in a way that violated the Fourth and Eighth Amendments. Specifically, they claimed that the strip searches were unnecessary, demeaning, dehumanizing, and humiliating.

The plaintiffs had to stand naked in a line with 8-10 other inmates in a room with other inmates and guards who were not conducting the searches. The prisoners who were menstruating had to remove their menstrual products, they were not given new ones, and many got blood on themselves, their clothes, and the floor. The prisoners had to stand barefoot and naked on a floor covered in menstrual blood, raise their breasts, life their hair, turn around, bend over, spread their buttocks and vaginas, and cough.

The case was assigned to Judge Richard Mills. On October 21, 2014 Judge Mills granted the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification. 2014 WL 5349870 (C.D. Ill. 2014). Judge Mills certified the two classes. Class I included all individuals subjected to the March 31, 2011 strip search at Lincoln Correctional Center. Class II included all women who are incarcerated at Logan Correctional Center and all women who will be incarcerated at Logan Correctional Center in the future. Lincoln Correctional Center was converted to an all-male prison and the majority of inmates were sent to Logan Correctional Center.

On April 14, 2016 the district court granted summary judgment for the defendants on the Fourth Amendment claim because, it held, a visual inspections of a prisoner could not constitute an unreasonable search. 2016 WL 11265636 (C.D. Ill. 2016). The district court denied summary judgment on the Eighth Amendment claim and that claim went to trial.

A jury trial was held before Judge Mills on November 14-18, 2016. On November 21, 2016, the jury returned a verdict for the defendants, finding that the searches had not been intended to humiliate or conducted to gain sexual gratification. Judge Mills entered the verdict for the defendants on November 22, 2016. The plaintiffs appealed; they did not contest the jury verdict against them on the Eighth Amendment claim but appealed to the Seventh Circuit to reinstate the Fourth Amendment claim. (Docket No. 16-04234).

On November 30, 2017, the case was argued in front of a panel of three judges: Circuit Judge Frank H. Easterbrook, Circuit Judge Daniel A. Manion, and District Judge John Z. Lee (sitting by designation). On July 16, 2019, the Seventh Circuit issued an opinion affirming the decision of the District Court that granted summary judgment to the defendants. Judge Lee dissented, arguing that whether or not the Fourth Amendment applied depended on whether the prisoners had a reasonable expectation of privacy, not on whether guards or the prisoners themselves conducted the searches. 930 F.3d 836 (7th Cir. 2019).

Rehearing en banc was granted December 18, 2019. 788 Fed. Appx. 387 (Mem). On May 14, 2020 the case was argued en banc via Zoom.

On August 11, 2020 the en banc Seventh Circuit reversed the previous panel’s ruling. In an opinion by Circuit Judge Amy J. St. Eve, the court held that “the Fourth Amendment protects a right to bodily privacy for convicted prisoners, albeit in a significantly limited way, including during visual inspections.” 969 F.3d 769, 774. The Seventh Circuit then remanded the case back to District Court for further proceedings on the plaintiff’s Fourth Amendment claims. Judge Easterbrook, who wrote the reversed panel opinion in this case, filed a dissent, arguing that convicted prisoners have no rights under the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 788.

The District Court received the Court of Appeal's mandate on September 3, 2020, but no proceedings have happened as of October 1, 2020. The case remains open.

Sabrina Glavota - 05/20/2020
Jonah Hudson-Erdman - 10/07/2020


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