For the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services, they are meant to keep the state’s prisons as safe as they can be.

But for Brian True, an officer at the Lincoln Correctional Center, the random searches of employee vehicles are nothing but clear violations of the U.S. Constitution.

“If they ask me, what do I have to hide? I’d say, ‘I have nothing to hide. Why do you want to violate my constitutional rights?,’” he said.

The department began random searches of employee vehicles on its public lots a few years ago as part of a longstanding general effort to keep the prisons safe.

“Everything we do is interdiction strategy,” Corrections Department spokesman Steve King said. “It’s a way for us to control what’s going on in our facilities.”

True agreed that one way to minimize trouble inside the prisons is to keep contraband out.

Employees should be subject to searches once they’re inside the prisons and beginning their shifts, he said. And, he said, vehicles coming into secured parking areas ought to be searched.

But random searches — searches done when there’s no reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing — go too far, he said.

Employees have the right to refuse the vehicle searches, but that puts them at risk of suspension without pay, True said.

“There are very fine (legal) parameters in doing searches that I think they’re crossing,” said True, who contends the searches violate the Fourth Amendment ban against unreasonable searches and seizures.

“This is a very fundamental right,” said True, in his 13th year as a Corrections Department employee. “I don’t want the king quartering troops in my home, either.”

True has had direct experience with the department’s policy. His vehicle has been searched twice this year.

“I consented,” he said, “but I told them it was under duress.”

The experience prompted him to file a complaint with the Nebraska Ombudsman’s office — and to look for relevant case law.

That search yielded Wiley v. Department of Justice, a federal appeals court decision True says supports his argument.

Derrick Wiley, a teacher in a Miami federal prison, refused a search of his vehicle on the prison parking lot. He then drove away but returned later and consented to the search.

He was fired for the initial refusal. After an administrative judge upheld the termination, Wiley took his case to an appeals court.

The appeals court in May 2003 ruled in Wiley’s favor, finding that prison officials had no reasonable suspicion to do the search, making it a violation of the Fourth Amendment.

King said the vehicle searches here have been conducted with little opposition.

“Our primary mandate is public safety,” King said. True is “certainly in the vast minority of individuals who have a problem with this.”

True said he was aware of one other employee who filed a complaint about the searches. That was two years ago, and the complaint faded away when the employee quit, True said.

That seems unlikely this time around. Indeed, a lawsuit from True seems likely, especially after the ombudsman office’s formal response last week to the searches.

Carl Eskridge, an assistant ombudsman, said in an earlier interview he had concerns about the “randomness” of the searches, but a letter from Ombudsman Marshall Lux to Corrections Director Robert Houston said a “reasonable argument can be made” for the legality of the searches. The letter suggested the department take specific steps to justify the searches to employees and, possibly, judges.

Eskridge could not be reached for comment.

Steps suggested by the ombudsman include that the Corrections Department develop a clear statement of the searches’ purpose. It should also be able to show the searches are, in fact, random.

“I’m pretty disappointed,” True said. “This is a whitewash, a candy-coating, that’s going on.”

He pointed to a statement in the letter that the searches “could be” constitutional.

“If they’re not positive it’s constitutional, why not suspend it” until the question can be answered, he said.

True said he plans to meet with an attorney.

“I want Wiley reaffirmed here,” he said. “I’m prepared to go to federal court to do it.”

Reach Clarence Mabin at cmabin@journalstar.com or 473-7234.