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Community Corner

Southampton Village Strip Search Case Appeal Withdrawn

Cost of litigation cited as reason.

After seven years in court and hundreds of hours in legal fees, a woman who sued Southampton Village for more than $1 million following a 2003 strip search, claiming at the time that her Fourth Amendment rights were violated, recently withdrew her appeal.

Stacey Hartline’s lawyer, Frederick Brewington of Hempstead, said it wasn’t due to a lack of merit. The costs just became too much to bear.

“An appeal is a very costly thing and it is very difficult for a young lady such as her to keep fighting and paying for litigation on this level,” Brewington said Friday. He said it comes down to the old adage of how difficult it is to fight city hall.

Hartline, 21 years old at the time of her arrest, claimed a strip search following a marijuana arrest violated her Fourth Amendment rights as it was “in absence of reasonable suspicion.”

“It wasn’t based on lack of merit,” Brewington emphasized. “We believe there was ample merit to go forward on an appeal.”

Brewington’s comments come in spite of the most recent ruling by a federal court in June 2009, which cleared the village of liability, deciding that the search was justified and did not violate Hartline’s rights. She had filed a notice of appeal in January 2011.

“Quite frankly, we didn’t see anything that they could hang an appeal on, because there weren’t any issues at trial,” said Jeltje DeJong of Devitt Spellman Barrett in Smithtown, the attorney who represented the village in the case.

Hartline was pulled over on Jan. 6, 2003, by village police officer Anthony Gallo for reportedly missing a license plate. When he approached the vehicle, Hartline opened her door because her window was broken and could not be rolled down.  According to court documents, when Hartline then reached for her registration, Gallo noticed a marijuana stem on the floor of the vehicle, and when asked if Hartline had any other marijuana in the vehicle, she said he “could possibly find a roach or two in the truck” and she admitted having a container with marijuana seeds in it. Gallo found a container with marijuana and smoked joints, and a metal pipe and pipe bowl, court records state.

According to the defense, when Hartline was brought back to the police station for booking, Sgt. Darren Gagnon advised officer Marla Donovan to “make sure she didn’t have anything on her.” Hartline was instructed to lift her shirt and “flip” her bra, “but she was never completely topless,” and then asked to remove her thermal underwear and lower her underpants to the ground. She was then told to bend over for a visual inspection. There was no body cavity search.

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