A Muslim woman from Dearborn Heights is suing the Oceana County Sheriff’s Department for violating her Constitutional rights after she says she was forced to remove a religious head covering while being processed at the county jail last month for a traffic violation.
Fatme Dakroub, 34, says she was forced to remove her hijab when she was falsely arrested for driving on an expired license. The May 17 arrest took place while she and several family members were vacationing at the Lake Michigan sand dunes.
After arriving at the jail, Dakroub, a U.S. citizen who travels frequently to the United Arab Emirates, was told to remove the headscarf covering her hair, ears and neck. Having her hair and neck uncovered in public is a serious breach of faith and religious practice, the federal lawsuit claims.
Dakroub told officers she did not want to remove her headscarf in front of three male officers. When she asked to have a female officer oversee her booking, she was told it was not an option.
“Simply put, Dakroub was forced to remove her headscarf, against her will, and given no other option,” her attorney, Nabih H. Ayad said in the civil action. “Dakroub reluctantly removed her headscarf in front of the three male officers.”
She was forced to sit in a holding cell for three hours without the headscarf in front of male officers and multiple male inmates. “Dakroub was further degraded and humiliated when male inmates made advances on her and hit on her when she was not wearing her headscarf,” the lawsuit claims.
The lawsuit filed this month in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids seeks compensatory, punitive and economic damages in a jury trial.
Ayad says the lawsuit is venturing into unchartered territory with regards to religious freedom and heightened security measures.
Police could have patted down the headscarf much like pat-down searches are conducted at airports, he said. “No reasonable accommodations were made,” Ayad said. “They were very insulting and disrespectful to her.”
Oceana Country Sheriff Robert J. Farber did not return a phone call Monday seeking comment.
The U.S. Supreme Court on June 1 weighed in on the issue of hijabs in the workplace. An Oklahoma woman claimed she was denied a job at Abercrombie and Fitch because of her hijab. Justices decided the company’s failure to accommodate a job applicant who wore a hijab violated civil rights laws.
Ayad says the First and Fourteenth Amendments bar the government from making laws that interfere with the expression of religion. The American Civil Liberties Union says 69 percent of women who wear a hijab report facing discrimination.