The city has agreed to pay $33 million in a class-action settlement to 100,000 individuals who were illegally strip-searched at city jails between 1999 and 2007.
One plaintiff, 39-year-old David Sanchez from the Bronx, was told to strip after arriving at Rikers Island in 2006 for possessing pot.
"I squatted. I grabbed my butt cheeks. Wow, it's like a blur now, but I had to run my fingers through my hair, through my mouth. I had to grab my genital area and lift it for them," he says.
All the plaintiffs were arrested for low-level offenses, like jumping turnstiles, shoplifting, and trespassing. Mass searches as described by plaintiffs are illegal if there's no suspicion that they're carrying contraband.
The original lawsuit was filed in 2002.
New York City settled a US$33 million (€24.3m, £21.8m) class-action lawsuit involving nearly 100,000 former and current prison inmates who were illegally strip-searched. This is the third strip-search court case in the past decade.

The plaintiffs included convicts who were charged with misdemeanors including trespassing, shoplifting, and failing to pay child support. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of the inmates by the Manhattan law firm ''Emery, Celli, Brinckerhoff & Abady''. The lead lawyer, Richard Emery, said that "The city knew strip-searching was illegal in 1986. They said it was illegal and they stopped in 2002, and they continued to pursue this illegal practice without justification. We hope this settlement constitutes some semblance of justice."

The plaintiffs claimed that both men and women were strip searched, and forced to show their genitals to corrections officers. Woman who were menstruating were not excluded from this practice, Emery said.
 
One of the plaintiffs, David Sanchez from the Bronx, said that after he was arrested for a drug-possession misdemeanor, an officer forced him to "squat...grab my butt cheeks...run my fingers through my hair and through my mouth. I had to grab my genital area, and lift it for them."