## Facts

- Maria Levka, age 53, was arrested in Chicago on a misdemeanor charge on December 2, 1975, and transferred to the Women’s Central Detention Facility.
- The City enforced a blanket policy requiring a strip search of every female arrestee at that facility, without regard to the charge or any individualized suspicion of weapons or contraband.
- The procedure required Levka to lift her blouse and brassiere for visual inspection and then lower her pants and underpants.
- The search was conducted by female personnel in a cell; the officers were described as professional and not overtly abusive.
- Levka testified that she felt humiliated and degraded and later experienced emotional distress, including fear of going out alone at night and continuing feelings of shame; she sought psychiatric help once.
- In related litigation, the City’s blanket strip-search policy had already been held unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause; in this action the City admitted liability, leaving damages as the only trial issue.

## Issues

1. Whether the jury’s $50,000 compensatory damages award for emotional distress from the unconstitutional strip search was so excessive that it required appellate intervention.
2. What level of deference is owed to a jury’s compensatory damages verdict in a § 1983 action, and how comparable awards may inform the excessiveness inquiry.
3. Whether the evidence and any aggravating circumstances justified the size of the award, or whether it functioned as impermissible punishment in a case submitted only on compensatory damages.

## Decision

- The Seventh Circuit held that the $50,000 compensatory award was grossly excessive on this record.
- The court reversed the district court’s denial of relief from the verdict.
- The court ordered a remittitur reducing compensatory damages to $25,000, with the alternative of a new trial limited to damages if Levka did not accept the reduction.
- Levka accepted the remittitur.

## Legal Principles

- Compensatory damages in § 1983 cases are primarily for actual injury, including proven emotional distress; they must remain tied to the evidence rather than operate as de facto punishment.
- Appellate courts give substantial deference to jury damage awards, but may set aside or reduce verdicts that are “monstrously” or grossly excessive in light of the record.
- Comparison to awards in similar cases is a permissible tool to evaluate whether a verdict falls outside the range supported by precedent and the severity of harm shown.
- Absent aggravating circumstances (such as physical injury, extreme abuse, or severe and well-documented psychological harm), large awards for a single, brief strip search may be reduced as excessive.
- Conditional remittitur is an appropriate corrective device: the plaintiff may accept a reduced amount or receive a new trial on damages.

## Conclusion

The Seventh Circuit concluded that, although Levka was entitled to substantial compensation for the humiliation and distress caused by an unconstitutional blanket strip search, the jury’s $50,000 compensatory award exceeded what the evidence and comparable cases supported; the judgment was therefore reduced to $25,000 through remittitur or, failing acceptance, a new damages trial.


Levka v. City of Chicago, 748 F.2d 421 (7th Cir. 1984)