Female inmates upset over searches

In incident statements filed by inmates with the company that runs the jail, more than a dozen women say they were strip-searched by female officers in their cells but that male officers were in the pod and either saw them or had the ability to see them naked during the search.

Male officers should never be in the pods during female strip searches, Tulsa County Criminal Justice Authority Chairman John Selph said.

"These people are professionals and should know better," he said. "Strip searches themselves are embarrassing and humiliating.

You're setting yourself up and asking for grievances if you have opposite-sex officers in the pod."

Corrections Corporation of America, which operates the jail, denies that the incident happened.

In a written response to the Tulsa World, CCA said the Dec. 21 search was authorized by the assistant warden, who had information that illegal drugs were in the pod. Some of the women involved are in jail on drug-trafficking and possession charges, booking records show.

"During the shakedown, a number of female inmates were strip-searched, some for probable cause and some at random. All strip searches were conducted by female officers and out of sight of the male officers," the statement said.

Tulsa County Contract Monitor Joe Masek said he has interviewed three of the women regarding the alleged incident and that about a dozen other women filed similar reports.

One woman claimed that a male sergeant stood in front of her door while she and her roommate were naked and that they repeatedly asked him to leave.

CCA's corporate office in Nashville, Tenn., confirmed that Assistant Warden Troy Casey, who authorized the search, was fired Jan. 19 but said his firing was not related to any one specific incident.

"Keep in mind we do have a new warden who is going to have his own management style, his own vision for the direction he wants to take that facility," said Steve Owen, CCA's corporate director of communications. "Certainly I think the corporate office wants to be responsive and supportive of that by surrounding him with the team that he needs to accomplish that."

The jail's new warden is Jim Cooke, who replaced Tim Baltz in January. Baltz took an administrative position at the corporate headquarters.