STRIP SEARCHES USUALLY LIMITED TO PRISONERS MIXING WITH OTHER
INMATES

Strip searches are not automatic at the Vancouver jail, but are used
regularly for prisoners who will be mixing with other inmates in a
cell, says a spokesman for B.C. Corrections.

Wayne Willows said strip searches are done to prevent weapons and
drugs from entering the facility at 275 Cordova St., managed by B.C.
Corrections.

"There's no other way we could run a jail if we could not search
people who are coming into our population, and I think that should be
self evident," Willows said. "We find stuff on a daily basis at the
Vancouver jail that has been concealed in one manner or another."

Booking of prisoners is done by Vancouver police, who share the
facility with B.C. Corrections. Depending on the charge or
circumstance, a person may not be strip searched, Willows said.

For example, someone taken into custody on outstanding traffic
violations would likely be held in a separate cell, away from the
general population of the jail.

But Willows admitted a suspected bad driver could be mixed with
someone on trial for murder, and that would mean the driver would be
strip-searched. The decision to conduct a strip-search is made between
the cops and corrections officers, he said.

"There is nothing intrusive in terms of the strip searching. In other
words, there's no hands on by the staff. So it is merely just a taking
off of clothing."

Last Friday, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Selwyn Romilly slammed the
Vancouver police for allowing the strip search of well-known civil
rights lawyer Cameron Ward.

Police arrested Ward on Aug. 1, 2002 as a suspect in a plot to launch
a pie at Prime Minister Jean Chr,tien, who was in Chinatown to
officially open the Millennium Gate.

No pie was found on Ward or in his car, and he wasn't charged. He has
since launched a civil suit

Responding to a police application to throw the case out of court,
Romilly wrote that "the police did in fact detain, imprison and strip
search [Ward], and seize and search his car arbitrarily and without
any legal justification."

Romilly said while he recognized the importance of protecting
Chr,tien, the rights of an individual must also be protected.

"Did the police officers really expect to find a pie hidden beneath
[Ward's] clothes?" the judge wrote

Insp. Rob Rothwell, in charge of the VPD's internal affairs unit, said
the search was not done to look for a pie, and noted the police
intervened before Ward was asked to remove his underwear.

"Nobody could be as foolish as to think that he's got a pie down his
pants," Rothwell said. "He was being searched for drug and weapon
paraphernalia that could be smuggled into the jail. Perhaps Mr. Ward
isn't involved in that type of environment where drugs would exist,
but many prisoners are."

Willows wouldn't comment on the Ward case.

While Ward waits for a date to be set for the civil suit, he is busy
representing two people who were strip-searched in the jail after
police arrested them for mischief at a demonstration in front of the
U.S. consulate.

Ward has said strip searches are against the law, and contravene a
Supreme Court of Canada ruling-Regina vs. Golden-that concluded "strip
searches are inherently humiliating and degrading for detainees... and
for this reason, they cannot be carried out simply as a matter of
routine policy."