A class action over the lawfulness of strip searches carried out by NSW Police at music festivals will begin next week.
The legal case, to be presided over by Justice Dina Yehia, will challenge the legality of NSW Police strip searching children at music festivals over six years between July 2016 and 2022, and has been brought by brought by the Redfern Legal Centre (RLC) and Slater and Gordon Lawyers.
Both RLC and Slater and Gordon have said the class action is on behalf of hundreds of other festival goers who allege their strip searches by police between 2016 and 2022 constituted unlawful acts.
These include assault, battery, and false imprisonment.
Court documents state the lead plaintiff, Raya Meredith, alleges she was strip-searched by NSW police at Splendour in the Grass in Byron Bay in July 2018.
They also reveal some of the people in the class action are considered "Vulnerable People" under NSW Law, which includes people who identify as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, disabled, children, or who come from a non-English background.
National Indigenous Times understands some of the plaintiffs who have joined the class actions identify as First Nations.
RLC Supervising Solicitor Sam Lee said the trial is an "important step" in holding NSW Police to account for their "degrading strip searches that thousands of festival goers were subjected to".
"For decades, people have been humiliated, intimidated, and often left traumatised by these experiences, with police officers abusing their powers," Ms Lee said.
It is understood the NSW government had attempted to have the class action thrown out in an unsuccessful motion, arguing there were insufficient common issues between all the people who were subjected to strip searches.
Practice Group Leader of Class Actions at Slater and Gordon, Rory Walsh, said over 3,000 have registered with the firm in respect of the proceedings.
"The lawfulness of those searches will be the focus of evidence," Mr Walsh said.
In 2023, the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission (LECC) found less than half of the officers who carried out strip searches at music festivals had completed the relevant specialist training, despite it being available.
Ms Lee said the class action was about "securing justice" for those who have been strip-searched, as well as ending "these invasive and unlawful practices".
"This isn't just about music festivals — it's about everyone's rights and the need for police to follow the law. Strip searches should never have been allowed to become routine practice," she said.
Under NSW law, a 'strip-search' means the search of a person or of articles in the possession of a person, which may include requiring the person to remove all of his or her clothes and examining the person's body (but not of the person's body cavities) and those clothes.
The Aboriginal Legal Service (NSW/ACT) chief executive, Karly Warner, previously described the practice of strip searching as "deeply intrusive" and "humiliating".
"The excessive use of strip-searching is causing extreme emotional and psychological harm…An unclothed and traumatic early encounter with police is something that children will have to deal with long after they're allowed to put their clothes back on," Ms Warner told Guardian Australia in 2020.
Last year, it was reported NSW police had an "alarming" tendency to strip search young people, with Indigenous children as young as 11 being subject to the procedure.
NSW Police also strip-searched Indigenous children at a higher rate than non-Indigenous children, an RLC accountability dashboard revealed. Of the 1532 children aged 11 to 17 strip-searched by police between 2017 and 2023, 689 (45 per cent) were First Nations.
