David A. Fahrenthold reports on illegal police strip searches in today's Washington Post:
The chaos of the D.C. police raid, with officers banging on the door of his Northwest Washington apartment building and chasing his cousin up the stairs, was over. William Turner III said he and his grandfather weren't carrying drugs, didn't have outstanding warrants and were just waiting for the police to leave.
Then, Turner alleges, a D.C. police officer took them to the basement and used his hands to search in Turner's underwear and probe between his buttocks. The officer, he said, also made Turner's 73-year-old grandfather strip naked from the waist down in a hallway between apartment units. Pendergast, the district commander, said officers were at Turner's apartment building on the day in question. She said police are investigating whether any officer searched Turner and his grandfather in the way Turner has described.
Let's take a little glimpse into the future. The district commanders says that the department is investigating whether or not Turner and his grandfather were strip searched. Yeah, okay.
The department will, of course, claim the search never occured or that Turner and his grandfather were belligerant and that officers were concerned for their safety or some such nonsense. That's what happens when cops break the law. They lie about it and/or "forget" key details. Then department leaders cover it up. I see this little internal investigation going nowhere. This incident will be decided in civil court. And the abuses will continue.