Michael C. v. Gresbach. A social worker entered a private school, without warrant and demanded to see two children she suspected had been spanked by their parents. She demanded the school not contact the parents and also denied any school official to be in the room while she “questioned” the children. The course of her “questioning” also included her forcing the children to partially disrobe in order for her to “examine” them for evidence of abuse. What was particularly alarming, according to the parents’ and children’s attorney, is the fact that this social worker’s behavior was not
unusual“The social worker performed these strip searches as a matter of routine, estimating that in perhaps one-half of the 300 or so cases she handled every year she subjected kids to a partial disrobing,” he said. “In fact, she testified that she considered it so routine that she did not bother to discuss her intentions with her supervisor, even though she spoke to her on her way to the school.”
The state had several social workers file affidavits saying they would have followed the same procedure. Crampton said, “That is an alarming admission, and we suspect you would find a similar pattern in social service offices all over America.”
The social worker maintained not only did she have a “right” to conduct such a search but that she was immune from lawsuit.
Happily, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously disagreed with her:
“While we recognize that ‘child welfare caseworkers are often called upon to make difficult decisions without the benefit of extended deliberation’ in order to prevent ‘the most vulnerable members of society, children of tender years, from being physically abused,’ Heck, 327 F.3d at 525, we do not believe that requiring a child welfare caseworker to act in accordance with basic Fourth Amendment principles is an undue burden on the child welfare system, particularly when it is necessary to conduct an examination of a child’s body, which is undoubtedly ‘frightening, humiliating, and intrusive’ to the child. At the time Gresbach conducted the searches at Good Hope in 2004, there was a clearly established doctrine as to what actions a Bureau caseworker must take when conducting a child abuse investigation at a private school.”
What do you know? Parents do have Constitutional rights!
Even parents in private, Christian schools.
Whodda thunk it?
My fear is that this is probably more common than we would think. A friend retired from the USAF in 1994 and got a job as a social worker in Illinois. He told me similar stories and was surprised when I questioned the legalities of his action. He clearly had drunk the koolaid when he told me the states right to protect children superceded the Constitution. And this came from a person who'd been a criminal investigator for 20+ years!!!
