Johannes
Johannes v. Alameda County Sheriff Dept.
Opinion
Lead Opinion
MEMORANDUM **
Gerald P. Johannes brought this pro se civil rights action, alleging that a county jail’s blanket policy of strip searching inmates violated his Fourth Amendment rights. The district court granted summary judgment to defendants, and we affirm.
Johannes was convicted in 1993 on seven counts of lewd and lascivious acts with children, CaLPenal Code § 288(a), and three counts of continuous sexual abuse of a child, Cal-Penal Code § 288.5. Before his release from prison, the state petitioned for his civil commitment under California’s Sexually Violent Predators Act (SVPA), Cal. Welf. & Inst.Code § 6600.1. During the pendency of his appeal of that petition, Johannes was temporarily lodged at the Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County as a witness in an unrelated matter. When he arrived there, he was subjected to a visual strip and body cavity inspection. He was similarly searched each day he returned from the courthouse. The searches were performed pursuant to a jail policy providing for visual strip searches of “inmates who have been ... outside of the secured facility ... upon return to the facility or housing unit.”