Attempt theft by TSA in CLT
 

A co-worker of mine(who didn't know any better) put his wallet , social security card & a couple other things in the bin while going through TSA. When he got to the other side no items had came out. When he inquired about his belongings the response was they didn't know. So he did stand up & tell them he was going to call the police. Well guess what, his items appeared in a bin on the other side.

I explained to him that those folks were going to steal his belongings. He didn't even think of that until I told him as he was just happy to get his stuff back.

If you put those 3 things in a bin, normally it's too light to pass through the xray. The items could have possibly fallen out, and had been re-ran.

I agree. Cant tell you how often people believe they had sent their items through the x-ray, and believe someone took them - only to learn they are still outside the x-ray belt, the bin too light to push itself through the other side. Sometimes bins will even be stuck on the inside curtain, yet as far as the x-ray operator knows, the items went through, as the machines do not tell you something is still inside. And usually when they accuse people of theft, TSOs or other passengers, and the property turns up when we realize it's missing, they don't apologize to anyone. But that's ok ;)

Folks maybe I wasn't clear. The items appeared in a bin in the OTHER lane. Not the one he was in.

IF you see TSO is trying to attempting take someone wallet out of bin. You have try reports to TSA Supervisors immediately and You have explains to him and he will have to called the police for that. HE could be almost arrested for that. He can't touching the personal belongings at security. He could be very serious trouble for that.

Ah, well I've seen that happen too, and for various reasons. One, a passenger does not fully push in their bin as I described above, and the next passenger gets frustrated with the bin blocking them. Most people just push it in. I've seen it happen a few times where the following passenger takes the left behind bin and puts it through another lane; some sort of revenge, I guess. Two, sort of same story, but a TSO does it (some TSOs are asses, we know this). Three, a passenger behind moves to another lane and a TSO helps by grabbing their bins and grabs another passengers by mistake and sends it through another lane (guilty of this myself). Four, of course possible theft.

There is no way to know if it was an attempt at theft with the info you provided.

Your correct, there really is no way to know, however my guess is either number 2 or number 4:td:

I would think that a TSA would grab some cash out, and not take the entire wallet. This way, you probably wouldn't notice until much later, if at all.

Sometimes my things get lost in the shuffle when people get the deluxe treatment. Implants, double alarms, etc. For some reason, the screener either mistakenly grabs the wrong bin, or the guy would point to it as being his by mistake.

If you were really curious, you should have the supervisor bring up the video. Most places have localized viewing stations now, and the cc video isn't as big of a deal to review as it used to be. If it's "working", that is.

I don't believe it was an attempt at theft, and here is why. It should be obvious the bin was not fully pushed into the x-ray, otherwise it would have come out the end. It was left outside the x-ray and walked by someone to the other lane and sent through.

If I were going to steal from a wallet that would draw too much attention (but anything is possible). What I would do is this: wait till the passenger is through the WTMD, can't see what's happening, "fiddle" around with the bin and remove the cash, and then push it through the same lane. Thus, the victim would not know something was up. By sending it through the other lane, obviously something happened - not the best thing to do if you don't want unwanted attention.

I suspect what happened is as another poster and I mentioned - it was grabbed by mistake. And it's also possible it was grabbed by mistake on the sterile side of the x-ray. I have done this too, and have had another TSO return the property to the x-ray lane.

Just my opinion.

If by someone you mean a screener I accept that might have been the case, but begs the question for what reason other than theft ?

As for another passenger picking up a tray and walking it to a different lane, you can't be serious. Even IF that were to be true, none of the posse of screeners swarming the checkpoint would notice and stop it ?

Try a more credible "excuse".

"Hear no evil, See no evil, Speak no evil" (I really like the cartoon here, but did not want to direct-link the image without getting consent)

There is a lot going on at the checkpoint and many passengers don't know what belongs to whom.

Each passenger should still know what belongs to them and not touch anything else. Personally, I refuse to touch the gear of any other traveler, even to push it into the x-ray in-feed.

That's what happened to me at BWI many years ago. I was alert the next trip through and stopped a repeat.