By Guillermo Contreras
San Antonio Express-News
SAN ANTONIO — A federal judge on Wednesday approved a $3 million settlement of a class-action lawsuit alleging thousands of people were illegally strip searched in Bexar County Jail.
Over objections of some plaintiffs, Chief U.S. District Judge Fred Biery agreed the settlement was the best deal possible. Part of the settlement says the county would add some of the $2.5 million it’s seeking in a lawsuit against one of its insurance companies.
The suit, filed in 2007, alleged a blanket strip search policy violated inmates’ constitutional rights. As a result of the case, the jail in April 2009 dropped its policy to do strip searches of every inmate. The procedure now is applied only to detainees charged with felonies or those suspected of having contraband.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs, Gary Mason and Sam Lock, said 30,000 people qualify for the settlement. The deal applies to inmates booked on misdemeanor charges and searched between Nov. 15, 2005, and April 9, 2009.
Ten opted out of the settlement, and could bring their own suits against the county, Biery was told.
The plaintiffs’ lawyers get $900,000, the administrator of the class gets $400,000 and three named plaintiffs each get $15,000. The rest of the pot, about $1.6 million, will be divided among the rest of the inmates.
Those who were booked on misdemeanors involving drugs, firearms or shoplifting will get payments of $100. The payments of those booked on other misdemeanors will range from $400 to $900, depending on whether the county gets the money it’s seeking from its insurer, Lock and Mason said.
David Compian, 38, said he’d been through five or six searches after being booked on misdemeanors involving abuse of inhalants.
“Something’s something, no?” said Compian, who attended the hearing. “Who’s going to give you $100?”
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