Transgender Inmate’s Strip-Search Suit Trimmed by 8th Circuit

Guards at a Missouri state prison must face a lawsuit filed by a transgender female inmate alleging mistreatment in connection with an aggressive and humiliating strip search, and retaliation after she filed grievances and a lawsuit over the incident.

The doctrine of qualified immunity shielded the guards from liability for some—but not all—of the inmate’s claims related to the incident, the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit said Thursday, reversing in part a lower court’s denial of the guards’ motion to dismiss.

Plaintiff Sease M. Beard sufficiently alleged that the incident qualified as an unreasonable search of her ...