Twenty women detained in San Francisco County Jail No. 2 filed a federal class action against the city, sheriff, sheriff’s department, and individual deputies. The women allege federal civil rights violations tied to a mass strip search where deputies forced them to strip in front of each other while laughing and filming with body-worn cameras. They describe the incident as part of ongoing harassment at the jail. The lawsuit seeks compensation, punitive damages, and a jury trial. The claim references a mass unlawful and degrading strip search in B-Pod on May 22, 2025, followed by continuing harassment, intimidation, and gender-based violence. Additional allegations include a deputy using a flashlight to illuminate a woman’s vagina and a deputy refusing a hospital room during a mother’s pelvic exams and breastfeeding in September 2025.
"“This Claim arises from a mass, unlawful, and degrading strip search of women housed in B-Pod of the San Francisco County Jail on May 22, 2025, and from the continuing harassment, intimidation, and gender-based violence by deputies in the days and weeks that followed,” Bertolino wrote in that claim."
"Women told Mission Local in November that, a year ago t oday, deputies forced them to strip down in front of each other while the deputies laughed and filmed them with body-worn cameras. The women said the alleged incident was just one example of ongoing harassment at the jail."
"Their lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of California, is demanding compensation, punitive damages, and a jury trial. Civil rights attorney Elizabeth Bertolino and personal injury attorneys Anthony Label and Molly Ryan filed the suit. The complete text of the lawsuit was not immediately available, but Bertolino filed a claim, the first step toward a lawsuit, with the city in November, Mission Local first reported."
"Meanwhile, illegal invasive searches continued, according to the two law firms now representing the women, Bertolino Law and the Veen Firm. Their complaint describes one deputy who, in July 2025, used a flashlight to illuminate one woman's vagina, and another who refused the hospital room as a mother received pelvic exams and breastfed her newborn in September 2025."
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