There’s a follow-up on a case involving Valencia College that I’ve been covering since 2015. The case raises a number of issues that I find troubling. Eva Fedderly reports on the latest developments, which include a judge disagreeing that a required vaginal ultrasound probe is a Fourth Amendment “search” under the conditions of this case:
However, the 11th Circuit reversed last October and reinstated the case, finding that inserting a probe into a woman’s vagina is plainly a search when performed by a government entity like a public college.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Gregory Presnell disagreed with the 11th Circuit on the issue of an unconstitutional search and dismissed the women’s Fourth Amendment claims.
“Milward and Ugalde were not children who were strip searched for illicit drugs,” Presnell wrote, citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2009 ruling in Safford v. Redding. “They were adults who enrolled themselves in a highly competitive medical program and exposed their bodies as part of an in-class medical procedure. And the plaintiffs have failed to present any other case that shows the conduct here was prohibited by clearly established law, at least under the Fourth Amendment.”
However, Judge Presnell allowed all other claims against the school and its employees to stand, including the plaintiffs’ First Amendment retaliation claim.
Read more on Courthouse News, despite the fact that their editors showed incredibly poor taste in that headline.
I wonder what that judge would have held if it was a procedure involving the male genitalia.
Thanks to Joe Cadillic for sending this along.