Video: Police Strip Search of Ohio Woman Called Outrageous

As you may know, employment law is just a subset of civil rights in general. I don’t normally cover non-workplace civil rights issues, but a news story I’ve come across seems just too egregious to let pass.

In Stark County, Ohio, 41-year old Hope Steffey was the victim of assault by a relative. Steffey’s cousin called 911 and a Stark County deputy arrived on the scene. Somehow Steffey ended up being arrested and taken to the Stark County Jail. She was then forced to lie facedown in her cell while seven male and female sheriff’s deputies stripped Steffey’s clothing from her body. A video was obtained by WKYC News which shows Steffey screaming and begging the deputies to stop as she is stripped completely naked. Warning: the video is graphic and disturbing. Steffey’s attorney alleges she was never asked to remove her clothes voluntarily and that she had to resort to wrapping herself in toilet paper in order to cover herself and stay warm overnight. When she was booked, she was allegedly given only a vest to clothe herself with.

We like to think we live in an advanced civilized society. But a single incident like this reminds us all that brutal savagery lies just beneath the surface. What makes this case worse is that the transgressors were government agents charged with protecting people. We must always be vigilant.

“Is man’s civilization only a wrappage, through which the savage nature of him can still burst, infernal as ever?”
~Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution, vol III, book V, chapter 7

3 Comments

  1. Daniel Cotter on November 15, 2017 at 8:09 am

    They are going to be thinking that it is now open season for strip searching beautiful women.

    Don’t the police need probable cause before they search you? Aren’t we protected against unreasonable searches by the U.S. Constitution? After all, the 4th Amendment says the following….
    “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
    Unfortunately, not even the Supreme Court seems to care much about the U.S. Constitution anymore. In the “new America” you don’t get any rights. Instead, the government gives you a limited number of “privileges” that it can revoke at any time.
    So when we see this kind of behavior by authorities in the United States we should be very concerned. And when we see the U.S. Supreme Court giving the stamp of approval to this kind of activity, we should be sounding the alarm.

  2. billpayer008 on October 10, 2015 at 8:36 pm

    pervert scum police……

  3. Alice Thomson on November 23, 2009 at 9:27 pm

    Nice videos!!! I agree with everything. After watching the video, I am truly disgusted and can’t find a damn thing funny about it. Of course, we are only seeing one side of the story, but for the life of me, I can’t even begin to understand why she was subjected to such treatment. American society is decaying faster, and in worse ways, than I previously thought.

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