Well then, in the event this goes to litigation, let me be the first to say: Hi federal district court clerk! Good luck sorting this one out!
I doubt this will go to litigation. Very likely the school district will simply make the decision to not do these K9 searches any more, but we will see.
Over what, a letter ‘asking’ them to stop? Seems unlikely. As mentioned several times upthread, there’s plenty of precedent supporting a school administration’s right to have drug dogs brought into the school under certain parameters.
If those parameters had been violated, and if the ACLU thought they had a case, they’d be doing a lot more than asking nicely.
I checked out the ACLU’s Web site, and their “student speech and privacy”* section is pretty quiet on the issue of student searches.
Any chance you’re going to get a copy of the letter?
*link: Search ACLU | American Civil Liberties Union
It has brackets and didn’t want to embed properly.
A letter asking them to stop implies a subsequent lawsuit forcing them to stop. The school district is unlikely to push things, especially considering the search turned up nothing.
As the parent of a kid who did just that - it is batshit stupid and it isn’t the end of the world.
And the chain of custody for evidence (I think that’s what its called, I’m not an attorney) makes it really easy for someone who wants to fight it to fight it. But since the kids generally get a slap on the wrist, drug education and some community service time, and since you don’t want to send the message to your weed smoking kid that its okay to bring it to school (you stupid idiot!) or that its okay to sit through History class baked (well, maybe if you were getting As, but not since it apparently affects your ability to listen and retain information) - as a parent, most accept the mild consequences.
My own suspicion is that this is done less to find the weed than to find the heroin and prescription drugs - which ARE dangerous. Kids who deal in school sometimes deal more than weed - if the dog finds weed, they might find heroin or oxy.
The other thing is that weed use is up - and it is really hard to retain information in History if you are baked. Schools have been under a lot of pressure to get test scores up and kids graduating - if fewer kids coming to class high will help, they’ll take that step.
You think? If that were the case then all the ACLU would have to do is send a letter after the first time any given district performed a legal search. No more searches anywhere!
Except it doesn’t work that way. The district has its own lawyer, and he or she will no doubt assure that superintendent that the searches are fine so long as they’re not used too frequently.
Still, I’d be interested to see the letter - particularly the case law they plan to cite.
None of the cases cited in your source describes a similar situation. There is one describing a dog sniff of all lockers, but that is far less intrusive than a requirement that all bags be left in a hallway. In any case, all of those decisions predate Jardines, in which SCOTUS essentially overturned at least part of the reasoning underlying prior dog sniff cases.
Personally I’m all for the searches. I’m sick and tired of good kids who go to school to get an education being endangered by all these troublemakers and their indulgent parents.
??
I was one of those “good kids”. I knew some kids who were into drugs. They barely affected me at all.
The ACLU basically writes two kinds of letters in these circumstances. One is the kind of letter you describe, implicitly or explicitly threatening a lawsuit. The other is more of a “we’re watching, and this is legally dubious” letter. I suspect the letter in this instance was the latter kind, in part because most affiliates wouldn’t bring a lawsuit on these facts (where the only injury was the fact of the search itself). My comment above was mostly tongue-in-cheek, out of amusement at the real but small possibility that this thread will be turned over in discovery.
Hey, my first reported case! 
Yes, I did get a copy of the letter. It states what the school did, states that it violates the students’ Constitutional Rights and spells out the precedents where previous court hearings have ruled in similar circumstances.
The precedents it cites are the following:
[ol]
[li]Tarter v. Raybeck, 1984 (Students do not shed their rights once they enter the school)[/li][li]The Fourth Amendment (Protection from unreasonable search and seizure)[/li][li]New Jersey v. TLO, 1985 (Courts recognize that students personal items such as backpacks and coats are protected under the 4th amendment)[/li][/ol]
The letter also cited the schools own Search and Siezure policy that was approved by the school board. It states that “The Board recognizes that the privacy of students or his/her belongings may not be violated by unreasonable search and seizure and directs that no student be searched without reasonable suspicion or in an unreasonable manner.” The policy also calls for searches to be done by a person of the student’s gender, in the presence of another staff member of the same gender and only in the case where the safety of the student or others is immediately threatened.
None of this was done during the K9 search.
I think the letter does a pretty good job of spelling out what the school did wrong and I think the school will re-evaluate its actions.
What gender were the backpacks?
The Hello Kitty ones were female, the GI Joe ones were male. The 1976 Olympic souvenir one was off in a cloakroom trying to figure out where the extra tab came from.
Regards,
Shodan
How about you quote the relevant item, or explain why it’s wrong?
My personal thought, though, not being a lawyer, is that nobody in Michigan gives a shit what New Jersey courts rule on this.
New Jersey v TLO went to the US Supreme Court.
However, the ruling was (very strongly) in favor of the school.
The court held that the search of the student did not violate the 4th amendment’s requirement that a search be reasonable.
It’s important to remember that your district was very deliberate, in their policy, when they used the phrase “reasonable suspicion.” “Reasonable suspicion” is very easy to establish for a school.
Meanwhile, were any students actually searched? A dog sniffing a backpack does not, afaik, constitute a search - let alone an unreasonable one. The reasonable suspicion is established if/when a dog picks up a positive scent on a backpack. At that point, the protocols for actual searches will/should kick in.