U.S.</a> parents of high school students in a small Wisconsin town are asking the school board to take action against administrators who conducted intrusive searches of several students suspected of vaping.

Currently, at least one family has hired a lawyer.

The search took place between January 17 and 18, when some students were found vaping at Suring High School. School administrators, along with police, ordered several students to undress and undergo searches for vaping devices. Boys and girls were searched separately by same-sex adults. The school did not notify parents until the search was complete.

Suring School District Superintendent Kelly Casper was involved in the search of the girl along with a school nurse and female law enforcement officers. The boy was searched by a male principal and a male police officer. At least six girls were searched, but the total number of students involved is unknown.

Suring is a village of less than 1,000 residents about 50 miles northwest of Green Bay in Oconto County. Surin High School has about 120 students, according to the Green Bay News-Gazette.

At the Surin Public Schools board meeting on Feb. 9, more than a dozen parents voiced their concerns about body searches, according to media that first reported the matter. Parents say the searches were conducted without their knowledge or consent, in violation of the district's own policy.

Parents who spoke at the conference appeared to be far less concerned that their children might be vaping than the school's abuse of student civil liberties and the lack of communication between the school and parents.

"Things do need to change and you need to decide what needs to be done," one parent told the school board. "Sometimes it's the only place they're safe, but they've taken it."

"She was taken to a room, she was given her e-cigarette, and the supervisor told her she was going to strip search anyway," the parents of one girl told the media after a board meeting. "She took her off and only She took off her bra and underwear, and the administrator told her to pull the bra out and look down to make sure there was nothing there."

"I was told after a few hours that it was done and she would be suspended," the parent added.

School district policy states that under no circumstances should school officials strip-search students. Parents of Suring students questioned why school staff involved in the search were not punished for violating policy. The school board said it was investigating the incidents.

"These are your policies," one parent told the school board. "I really want you to keep your eyes open because we're not leaving, we're going to make sure something is done."

"If this is any other business, it will not be tolerated," another parent said. "Whoever does this will be suspended while under investigation, so why not do it?"

Board of Trustees Chair Wayne Sleet later issued a statement saying: "The Surin School Board understands the seriousness of this situation. The school board is monitoring the situation closely and will issue a statement once the investigation is complete.

The Oconto County Sheriff's Department investigated some of the incidents and turned the information over to the Oconto County District Attorney's Office. But county District Attorney Edward Burke said no charges would be brought against school personnel because the search falls outside the state's legal definition of a strip search.

Wisconsin Statutes Section 948.50 defines a strip search as a search in which a person's genitals, genitals, buttocks, or anus, or a woman's breasts, are exposed or accessed by the person conducting the search.

But a civil rights attorney in Madison, Wisconsin, representing at least one student, disagreed. "I believe we'll be able to show that these searches violate the Fourth Amendment," said attorney Jeff Scott Olson, "and I think we have a pretty good damages case here."

"They're afraid to go to school," Suring's parent, Chad Noack, told the outlet. "They're afraid of having to be naked in front of other people, or stripped of their underwear. It's going to be with them all their lives -- work, going to church, basically whatever they do -- and it's going to haunt them."

School officials and law enforcement have identified student vaping as a major health and safety threat since public health officials declared teen vaping an epidemic in 2018. Many schools have responded to evidence of vaping by students, including removing bathroom doors, conducting random searches, conducting urine tests and suspending students for months.

In Montreal last November, four students were searched by school officials in an incident similar to the one in Wisconsin. Last summer, a group of teens on the Ocean City, Maryland, boardwalk were violently restrained and then arrested after refusing police orders to stop vaping.

As long as groups such as the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids and the Truth Initiative continue to exaggerate the supposed risks and health consequences of vaping, drug war-style enforcement incidents like the Surin raid will continue, and likely increase.

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