An Atlanta lawyer representing students subjected to invasive body searches during a mass—and warrantless—drug sweep at a South Georgia high school says the local sheriff who orchestrated the sweep conducted “900 illegal, suspicionless searches.”

“This was a textbook definition of overreach,” said attorney Mark Begnaud of Atlanta's Horsley Begnaud who filed a federal lawsuit Thursday on behalf of nine Worth County High School students ages 15-18. The students, along with the rest of the high school student body, were forced to submit to intimate and invasive body searches by local deputies, he said. “They pulled 900 students out of class. They did full, hands-on body searches.”

Begnaud said no illegal drugs or drug paraphernalia were found.

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