Ms Redding said the Supreme Court hearing was "pretty overwhelming" The US Supreme Court has been considering whether a school acted illegally in subjecting a 13-year old girl to a strip-search. Officials at Safford Middle School, Arizona, say they were acting on a tip-off that Savana Redding was hiding prescription-strength painkillers. Ms Redding's lawyers argue that the teachers needed "location-specific" information to carry out the search. The US constitution outlaws what it terms unreasonable searches. 'Invasion' Ms Redding, who is now 19 years old and in her first year of college, described the Supreme Court hearing as "pretty overwhelming". The incident took place when she was attending middle school in her home town of Safford, Arizona. After a fellow pupil accused her of giving her ibuprofen pills, the school's Vice Principal Kerry Wilson took Ms Redding into his office to search her bag. When no pills were found in the bag, Mr Wilson ordered Ms Redding to go to a nurse's office, where she says she was told to remove her shirt and trousers. There needs to be suspicion that the object is under the clothes

Adam Wolf

Lawyer for Savana Redding She says she was then asked to move her bra to one side and stretch her underwear waistband, exposing her breasts and pelvic area. No pills were found. A lawsuit brought by Ms Redding and her mother was dismissed by a federal magistrate, and that judgment was upheld by a federal appeals panel. But in July 2008, the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the search was "an invasion of constitutional rights," setting the stage for a legal showdown in America's highest court. The Supreme Court justices considering the case expressed concern that schools should not be barred from searching pupils who could be carrying dangerous substances. "My thought process is I would rather have the kid embarrassed by a strip search... than to have some other kids dead because the stuff is distributed at lunchtime," said Justice David Souter. But he also warned against setting a precedent that could expose pupils to even more intrusive searches, like body-cavity searches. "There would be no legal basis in saying that was out of bounds," he said. Lawyer Adam Wolf, acting for Ms Redding, argued that unless school authorities had specific information about the location of prohibited items, then strip-searches contravened the Fourth Amendment of the US constitution. "There needs to be suspicion that the object is under the clothes," he said. The court is expected to rule on the case by the end of June.



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