Switzerland. Geneva. A police officer is strip searching a prisoner in a cell at the Paquis police station. The man was arrested while selling drugs in the streets. The inmate is an african man from Guinea. The policewoman stands outside of the cell due to the nakedness of the prisoner. A strip search is a practice of searching a person for weapons or other contraband suspected of being hidden on their body or inside their clothing by requiring the person to remove some or all of his clothing. The strip search is a mandatory procedure which requires legal authority. It is done by a police officer once a person is arrested and locked in a cell. A police station or station house is a building which serves for police officers. The building contains temporary holding cells and interview/interrogation rooms. Both police officers wear a ballistic vest, bulletproof vest or bullet-resistant vest which is an item of personal armor that helps absorb the impact from knives, firearm-fired projectiles and shrapnel from explosions, and is worn on the torso. Soft vests are made from many layers of woven or laminated fibers and can be capable of protecting the wearer from small-caliber handgun and shotgun projectiles, and small fragments from explosives such as hand grenades. 10.05.12 © 2012 Didier Ruef