By Site Staff
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donkeyrock shared this story from  Police State USA.
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(Source: Yoon S. Byun/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
FLORIDA — A U.S. court has made a disturbing ruling in favor of abusive and invasive federal checkpoint procedures. The ruling established that TSA agents may read travelers’ private documents, threaten arrest for noncompliance, and lie about surveillance video without recourse.
While at the the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on August 27, 2011, a young man from Miami named Jonathan Corbett attempted to maintain a modicum of dignity while exercising his right to travel. In his words, he told the TSA not to “touch his junk” during the warrantless search of his person. Court documents laid out the facts of the incident:
The TSA screener explained how the pat-down worked. The screener would run the back of his hand along Corbett’s buttocks. The screener would place one hand on Corbett’s inner-thigh, the other hand on Corbett’s hip, and slide the hand on the inner-thigh up until meeting resistance.
Corbett refused to permit the TSA screener to conduct the standard pat-down and further stated the TSA screener could “not touch his genitals or buttocks” during the pat-down. The TSA screener told Corbett that his refusal to consent to the standard pat-down screening was “a problem” and summoned a supervisor.
To the supervisor, Corbett reiterated his demand that he not be touched on his buttocks or genitals, and the supervisor called the non-uniformed TSA manager, defendant Alejandro Chamizo, who came to the security checkpoint. Corbett alleged that defendant [Alejandro] Chamizo warned Corbett “that if he did not consent [to having his genitals and buttocks touched], he would be forcibly searched” and “would be arrested.”
After being threatened by TSA supervisor Alejandro Chamizo with forcible search and (false) arrest, TSA employees then dumped out Mr. Corbett’s bags, ignored his protests while looking through his personal documents, and photocopied sensitive material including his driver’s license.
Ultimately, after an hour of detainment, he was ejected me from the airport; all because of his objection to having his genitals touched.
Corbett, who is now 28, has been fighting in court against the TSA for the last three years.
One of the first legal hurdles was dealing with the government’s attempt to hide evidence. Mr. Corbett had filed a FOIA request to obtain the CCTV footage of the incident, but says that the agency flatly lied in a phone call that the video did not exist because airport cameras did not work. Corbett received similar treatment from the Broward …read more
Source: Donkeyrock_BlurBlog
