CA10: Once it was obvious the wrong person had been arrested, continuing booking through a strip search violated the Fourth Amendment

It readily became apparent that plaintiff was not the person wanted on the arrest warrant when processing at the jail began and she had no tattoos or moles as described in their paperwork. Nonetheless, they processed her, strip searched her, and mocked her when she was standing there naked and began lactating. She satisfied overcoming qualified immunity. Her initial arrest was for having too many of her nine children in the car with her. Archuleta v. Wagner, 523 F.3d 1278 (10th Cir. 2008):

Deputy Mandelko also could not have had reasonable suspicion that Ms. Archuleta had a weapon under these circumstances. Reasonable suspicion for a search is a minimum level of objective justification “based on the totality of the circumstances, taking into account an officer’s reasonable inferences based on training, experience, and common sense.” United States v. Rice, 483 F.3d 1079, 1083 (10th Cir. 2007). “The officer need not be absolutely certain that the individual is armed; the issue is whether a reasonably prudent [person] in the circumstances would be warranted in the belief that [her] safety or that of others was in danger.” Id. at 1082-83 (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 27, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889 (1968)). In this case, based upon the clothing Ms. Archuleta was wearing, the three “pat downs” she endured prior to being booked, and the absence of any tattoos or moles indicating she was the culprit, Deputy Mandelko could not reasonably suspect that Ms. Archuleta had a weapon on her person. See Foote, 118 F.3d at 1425.