Teenage boys strip-searched by police at Sydney festival

AN INQUIRY has been launched in Australia after police strip-searched 30 children at a music festival.

One officer ran his hands around a 17-year-old boy’s bottom and touched his genitals during potentially illegal searches at the Lost City Music festival in Sydney.

The event for under-18s was held in Sydney Olympic Park on Feb 23 and is now the subject of an investigation by New South Wales police.

Australian police are only allowed to carry out strip-searches in serious situations, and a parent or guardian of the suspect must be present if minors are targeted.

As public hearings began Dr Peggy Dwyer, counsel to the inquiry, said three girls and 27 boys had been stripsearched and only five had an appropriate adult with them.

The inquiry focused on the cases of three boys who were told by officers to touch their own genitals.

One of those, a 15-year-old boy said: “I felt like I’d just done something wrong but, like, I’m just trying to go to a music festival.”

A 17-year-old boy said he was told to “lift up his balls” and “squat and cough”, the inquiry heard. The third boy, aged 16, said he had been told to “grab his penis and lift it up”.

Dr Dwyer said: “The male officer inserted his hands inside [the boy’s] underwear, and made contact with his testicles.”

None of the three boys was found to be hiding drugs.

The most senior police officer supervising the event told the inquiry that an “insignificant number” of minors were strip-searched at the event which was attended by 10,000.

He said: “The risk of somebody bringing drugs into the event is very significant because it can lead to death.”