chollie

eyecue, given that TSA, like any organization of size, does sometimes employ 'bad apples' (or good people who go bad during the course of their employment), wouldn't it be appropriate for BDOs to also monitor TSOs from time to time?

Not all pax who exhibit 'suspicious behavior' are guilty of something TSA needs to worry about; not all TSOs who exhibit nervous behavior are guilty of something either, but some of them might be and it benefits everyone to weed them out of the workforce, wouldn't you agree?

halls120

I've been a DOJ employee for 17 years, and I don't know of a single one of our employees who has been found selling drugs out of their home. TSA, OTOH, has had how many?

Your agency hires people attracted from ads on pizza poxes, you undertake cursory background investigations, and you're surprised you have so many people that have no business working for the government in a security capacity?

Don't paint the rest of us with your stained brush.

jkhuggins

I'm on record multiple times here in TS&S as being opposed to the schadenfreude that occurs in situations like this.

However ...

TSA seems to spend considerable effort in publicly praising its employees who perform notable acts of public service while acting as private citizens. Each time it does so, TSA invites the scorn it receives when its employees perform ignoble acts while acting as private citizens.

If TSA wants to align itself with the private actions of its employees, it has to align itself with all of them --- good, bad, and ugly.

chollie

+1

I meant to post earlier: I have seen no evidence that she used her position as a TSO to facilitate her drug dealings in any way.

However, as you point out, no employer can or should have it both ways: publicly trumpet the private, personal accomplishments of its employees while declaring private, personal law-breaking activities off-limits.

Yoshi212

Even beyond trumpeting actions of its employees TSA has gone and stated that these problem employees are a minimal part of those at TSA. When you look at report after report after report after report of TSOs abusing power or misconduct on the job and outside of the job during employment your word becomes nothing. Which means your words mean nothing to the public. You can't win trust while betraying the public trust.

GUWonder

The agency that has messed up background checks for its employees wants passengers to be screened based on messed up background checks too. That's the large part of why this kind of topic is of such interest to me.

If the TSA got out of the passenger background checking and ID obsession game and if it stopped playing Junior Officer Friendly cop wannabe at the airport screening checkpoints, then the TSA could have more of a chance to focus on real problems in its own rank and file and better focus on contraband WEI interdiction. As long as the TSA remains distracted by obsessing about passenger ID and passenger background checking, these kind of TSA news items are going to keep getting at least some of the attention they deserve.

Schmurrr

Or maybe TSA is too big to manage itself.

Or maybe TSA wastes its resources on the inconsequential.

FliesWay2Much

And, right from the beginning, they kept asserting that they were God's gift to the War on Terror and that the survival of the country was their responsibility. They brought this on themselves.