L.A. County agreed to pay $53 million to settle a class action lawsuit over search practices at the Sheriff’s Department’s Century Regional Detention Facility.
The inmates, some of whom were menstruating, were told to remove their clothes and lift and spread their body parts, in full view of one another. Deputies yelled degrading comments and profanities as they made their orders. Some laughed.
A judge found the invasiveness of the strip searches — that the women had to expose their genitals in large groups, without any privacy — violated their 4th Amendment rights. Now thousands of former inmates, including Almaraz, are eligible to collect a share of a $53-million settlement as part of an agreement filed Tuesday in a class-action lawsuit.
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