Stir crazy in Portsmouth
Working in a jail is not reason enough to be stripped of one’s dignity or rights.
Pulling jail time entails many indignities, large and small — but working at a jail?
That should be a somewhat different experience, right?
Not in Portsmouth, it seems, where nine female workers have filed federal lawsuits against Sheriff Bill Watson for ordering “all civilian contract employees” to submit to strip searches, part of an investigation, the suit states, into drugs being brought into the jail.
May 3, 2012 - 7:59 AM
I absolutely see both sides of this one and the contraband does get there and something does have to be done…I think that I don’t really have a better solution.
The laws and policies that protect workers rights in Portsmouth apply to all employees including those that work in Jails. Therefore, the civilian contract Portsmouth jail employees that were violated have every right to file lawsuits against the Sheriff.