"This whole thing was very upsetting," Sheppard said. "It was humiliating."

Defining 'unreasonable'

In deciding this question, federal courts around the country weigh a number of factors - including the seriousness of the subject's offense, the length of the jail stay, and the evidence that the suspects might really have been hiding something underneath their clothes.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1979 that the federal prison in Washington did not violate inmates' rights by strip-searching them in order to keep out drugs and weapons. But the judges shied away from drawing a clear line between a legal strip search and an illegal one.

"In each case, it requires a balancing of the need for the particular search against the invasion of personal rights that the search entails," the court said.

In the 28 years since, state and federal courts have tried, case by case, to define what is an unreasonable search.

Some guidelines have emerged. Strip searches are permitted on inmates who have been convicted of serious felonies and sentenced to prison, so long as the searches are done in a private setting. Likewise, courts have found, it is appropriate to strip-search people arrested for violent felonies - but not those held merely for suspicion of drug use.

Tighter restrictions apply when people have been charged with minor crimes but not convicted.

Courts say those suspects can be made to strip only when police have a clear reason to believe they are hiding something that can't be found any other way.

Although the standards are still evolving, one rule has been clear for more than a decade: Jails and police departments cannot strip-search everyone brought into detention regardless of the offense. Federal appeals courts from New York to California have affirmed that rule again and again.

Judge Pamela Ryder, of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, wrote in a 2006 case that it was wrong to strip-search a female bartender suspected of using drugs. "Being under the influence of a drug does not necessarily indicate that the person has concealed more drugs in a body cavity," Ryder wrote.

The U.S. Supreme Court has let Ryder's ruling stand, as it has done with similar opinions.

In Pennsylvania, the key federal court decision came in 1993, when a group of women protesting a Labor Day pigeon shoot were held in the Schuylkill County jail and strip-searched.

"The feelings of humiliation and degradation associated with being forced to expose one's nude body to strangers for visual inspection is beyond dispute," federal judge Franklin Van Antwerpen ruled.

At the time of his ruling, state prison regulations actually required county jails to strip-search everyone, regardless of the crime.

Seven years later, the state finally rescinded that rule, belatedly taking notice of Van Antwerpen's decision that the protesters' rights were violated by "unreasonable and unjustifiable" strip searches.

But it failed to write a new policy. Even today, 14 years after the pigeon-shoot case, Pennsylvania still has not issued any legally acceptable rules for how jails should conduct strip searches.

Instead, the state has remained silent, allowing county jails to do as they see fit.

Pennsylvania Department of Corrections spokeswoman Susan McNaughton said her department would complete new rules in 2008 but would not comment further, other than to say the department is still working with counties on a complex issue.