ACLU urges Dothan schools’ superintendent to stop suspicionless searches at schools
April 1, 2006
DOTHAN — The American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama expressed serious concerns today about a suspicionless search conducted at Dothan City High School. The high school was locked down for several hours, while sixteen policemen and six police dogs swept the entire campus for drugs and weapons. Students’ lockers were searched and pat-downs were conducted as police dogs roamed the halls, classrooms, and parking lots. The sweep was conducted at the request of Dothan City School Superintendent Sam Nichols. While the ACLU supports Mr. Nichols’ goal of keeping our schools safe and drug-free, suspicionless, mandatory searches are constitutionally problematic, costly, and ineffective.
“Students do not shed their constitutional rights, including the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, at the schoolhouse gate. To pass constitutional scrutiny, a search must be justified at its inception,” said Allison Neal, a law fellow at the ACLU of Alabama. “Here, the blanket use of drug-sniffing dogs treats every student as a suspect, without any evidence of wrongdoing. These tactics raise grave constitutional concerns.”
Also, the use of drug-sniffing dogs is highly ineffective in combating drug abuse at our schools. Studies show that the best way to combat student drug use is through policies that address students’ values, attitudes toward drug use, and their perceptions of peer use. The Dothan City school system is taking scarce resources away from effective programs, to fund ineffective, and largely fruitless, drug searches. In this instance, only one student was found to possess marijuana.
Superintendent Nichols stated that Dothan City Schools have done several random searches for weapons and drugs since Columbine, and more lockdowns may be scheduled in the future. We urge Superintendent Nichols to reconsider utilizing these tactics. A students’ expectation of privacy should not be affected by being in or out of school. Any search conducted at public schools should be consistent with students’ constitutional rights. For every search that yields evidence of wrongdoing, a multitude of students have lost their expectation of privacy and had their constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches violated.
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