back to article TSA screener plants powder baggie in flier's luggage

A screener for the US Transportation Security Administration lost his job after pretending to plant a plastic bag of white powder in the carry-on luggage of a passenger at the Philadelphia International Airport. Rebecca Solomon was flying to Detroit on Northwest Airlines, the same city and carrier involved in the attempted …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    grr

    And if a traveller does something similar, or even mutters the word bomb, they end up in jail for a day being interrogated.

  2. Eugene Goodrich
    Paris Hilton

    Transcript

    (erstwhile) TSA guy: "Haha, just kidding; relax - you can get on the plane, you aren't going to be detained in one of the hidden white rooms here in the airport where we'd strip you naked and cavity search you until the police arrive and handcuff you and take you back to the station where you'd be put in a cell and interrogated for thirty-six hours until they decide to assign you a lawyer who will convince you to plea-bargain for a shorter felony sentence to commence a few months from now during which you'd be intimidated, beaten, and possibly raped by fellow inmates, mercifully culminating in your release in upstate New York penniless, creditless, friendless, homeless, and as an ex-convict nobody will hire.

    Yeah, this was just a little bag-of-powder joke me and the guys like to pull, heh."

    Paris, because she'd never frighten someone like that just for fun.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    That's called "inducing panic"

    And should be good for a stint in the local gaol.

  4. Aaron Em

    Yeah. real funny.

    Nice they're hiring people of Gallagher's and Carrot Top's caliber. Gives a real clear picture of this supposedly vital piece of our nation's security infrastructure.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Grenade

    What the hell?!

    It's enough of a pain in the ass to fly, as it is and this hucklehead didn't think that someone might notice an incident like this? He should go to trial and get jail time, for being such a moron.

    The Grenade just fits because I hate flying in and out of Detroit, even more now!

  6. Steven Hunter
    Flame

    Not punishment enough

    Considering the absolute shit-storm that the TSA would unleash on a *passenger* who tried the exact same "joke", this guy got off easy.

  7. Paul RND*1000

    Not sure which is most shocking

    That anyone with enough working braincells to be able to breathe unaided could have possibly thought this would be a good idea, or that a TSA screener demonstrated something that could almost be mistaken for a sense of humor.

    1. asdf
      FAIL

      TSA employees

      TSA does an excellent job of hiring the short bus window lickers of the world, no doubt about it.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      FAIL

      Random searches

      Having been subject to enough 'random'* searches - I can assure you that even the higher ups in the TSA are idiots. I think that this might go all the way to the Homeland (in)Security.

      * Random in that my kids and wife laugh every time they fly with me cause they know that I will get 'randomly' picked for extra screening. My kids even started videoing things until a few years ago when it was banned. (It was close to 100% for a while - and I fly 50 to 80k miles a year.)

      * Random cause I look Arab (or Jewish) and have a beard.

  8. Christoph
    Flame

    Damn right he should go

    The old "It's a young woman so it's funny to terrify her" gag? At least they've finally recognised that there are some things that security shouldn't be allowed to get away with.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Next month...

    Next month, he'll get to look at her naked.

    I wonder if she prefers the white powder joke, or that.

  10. wsm
    Stop

    Likely suspect?

    And the reason the young woman was chosen as the object of the "joke?" Sounds like something the PFY would do.

  11. Inachu
    Grenade

    Grrr!

    If she was my wife or girlfriend and I was behind her when this happend I would have body slammed the dude for being a fool.

  12. Petrea Mitchell
    Stop

    Note to self

    If a TSA screener ever asks me, "Where did you get this?" my reflexive response is now going to be, "The question is, where did *you* get it?"

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    Fly PTA

    Prison Transport Airlines.

  14. LenH

    Is this the same person...

    I wonder if this the same person whole stole my son's medications out of our checked luggage? Fool.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    worse thing happened in Japan

    In Japan the airport sometimes has luggage with marijuana inside to test the sniffer dogs.

    The luggage was always something that did belong to the airport until one very clever airport employee (look for the oxymoron here) decided to plant a bag of marijuana in the luggage of a passenger without informing the passenger of course.

    And then they couldn't find it.

    http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2008/05/26/japanese-customs-blunder-plants-marijuana-in-travelers-luggage-loses-track-of-it/

    Japan: the modern third world country

    WTF because that happens a lot around here

  16. Mike 102
    Grenade

    not just cannabis in japan...

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/08/slovakian_electrician_update/

  17. The Fuzzy Wotnot
    Unhappy

    Not funny...for the time being

    I am all for freedom of speech, but for the time being cracking jokes about bombs and carrying bags of sugar/talc in hand luggage is not funny due to the fact that their are too many nutters around who will follow the letter of the law and next thing you're off to Gitmo. In a 20 years time, we may be able to look back find it funny, but for the moment, best keep your jokes to places where they can be appreciated. Jokes involving terrorism and airports, while in an airport, is not a very good idea right now.

  18. Phalamir

    Failing Upwards

    "A TSA spokeswoman called the behavior "highly inappropriate and unprofessional" and said the man is no longer employed with the agency."

    Probably because the FBI snapped him up as prime investigative material

  19. Fatman
    FAIL

    What a Numbskull!!!!

    No doubt this fscking ID10T suffers from "s--- for brains syndrome".

    He should have been taken to Gitmo and waterboarded; then fired (assuming he survived).

    Now that I think about it, a good and proper waterboarding just may cure his ailment. A judicious application of water at a high pressure and volume up his arse would do the trick.

    1. kain preacher

      Here is how you get him

      Put what looks like a real bomb in is car Then put bunch of hate literature in the car . Call the cops aa say he wants to kill the president . Sure the cops might figure it out, maybe. But while he is getting raked over the coals and his life destroyed, call him up and said dude its just a joke.

  20. John Smith 19 Gold badge

    Hiring from the shallow end of the gene pool

    There should be a movie in this somewhere. so *many* possibiliites

  21. skeptical i
    Grenade

    I hope the lass sues up and down the TSA chain of command.

    I hate seeing my tax dollars wasted on bullshit, but someone needs to learn a lesson and since it's illegal to thrash people with a tire iron a lawsuit will have to suffice.

  22. Wize
    Grenade

    If he can wander about with an unidentified bag of white powder...

    ...then where is the security?

    Next we'll have bombs being smuggled through by some sympathetic security guard/baggage handler/idiot with a badge

  23. mego
    Big Brother

    I recall an incident

    When a violinist handed his violin case over and said, clearly, "it's NOT a gun". The guy was arrested (by a team of sub-machine-gun-toting SWAT members, no less); taken to the closest holding cells and interrogated for hours.

    He was eventually fined - heavily - and released (after spending the night in jail). Their excuse? "You don't play jokes with security". Rightly so, maybe a tad overboard though.

    How is this incident any different? Actually.. it is, but it is WORSE since the TSA clearly plant things in people's bags for fun.

    Yeah, gotta love the land of the "free"....

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Does no one else think this is funny?

    c'mon you lot, can you imagine what her face must have been like?

    yeah boarder rent-a-cop types are a pain but thats because at the begining of the decade they went from being desk clerk loosers to gun toting protectors of freedom. Finding one with a sense of humor is refreshing. Now we can only hope that word spreads to all of the analy fixated scum that abuse their newly found positions of power that its not on!

This topic is closed for new posts.