Friday, March 31, 2017

Mother’s outrage after ‘power-tripping’ airport security pat down 13-year-old son


30 March 2017

This is the moment airport security patted down a 13-year-old boy for two full minutes, leaving him ‘traumatised’, according to his mother.  Aaron Williamson, who suffers from Sensory Processing Disorder, was stopped while heading through security at Dallas/Fort-Worth International Airport.

His outraged mother Jennifer hit out at the transport security agency (TSA) in a Facebook post, claiming she and her son were ‘treated like dogs’. She was allegedly detained for ‘well over an hour’, during which time an airport officer extensively patted down her son, who was wearing cut off shorts and a T-shirt.

As an SPD sufferer, it is not known whether or not Williamson took advantage of TSA Care which takes into consideration certain conditions for travellers. His mother said: ‘He set off NO alarms. He physically did not alarm at all during screening, he passed through the detector just fine.

He is still several hours later saying “I don’t know what I did. What did I do?”. I am livid. Please, share [and] make this viral.’ In her post, which has been seen 7.1 million times, she calls for the TSA to be ‘reined in’. The American security agency brought in new rules recently calling for ‘comprehensive pat-down procedures’ for passengers.

Making searches more intrusive the standardised system replaces the choice airport customers previously had between body scanners or other technology only if they set off alarms. The TSA is standing by the controversial Texas incident.

‘In total, the pat-down took approximately two minutes,’ they wrote in a statement, ‘and was observed by the mother and two police officers who were called to mitigate the concerns of the mother. ‘The passengers were at the checkpoint for approximately 45 minutes, which included the time it took to discuss screening procedures with the mother and to screen three carry-on items that required further inspection.’ People on Twitter deemed the incident inappropriate with some calling it ‘near-molestation’.