From the Moonie paper article:
(Ooops, I'm stereotyping!)
*A Middle Eastern passenger attempted to videotape out the window as the plane taxied on takeoff and, when told by a flight attendant it was not permitted, "gave her a mean look and stopped taping," said a written report of the San Juan incident by a flight attendant.
As would I. There is no regulation that says one cannot tape or film or take photos out the window. AA does have a regulation listed in their magazine that says you cannot record or tape or photo the inside of their aircraft, but this guy wasn't doing that, he was pointed out the window. The only time I have been told to stop taking photos was on Aeroflot in the mid-1980's. Is this what America has become? OK, he was operating an "electronic device", perhaps, but then many people do this unwittingly during taxi and take-off.
A third pilot reported watching a man of Middle Eastern descent at the same airport using binoculars to get airplane tail numbers and writing the numbers in a notebook to correspond with flight numbers.
Hello, it is called plane-spotting! Being of Middle-Eastern decent (If Mesopotamia existed, then aren't we all?) does not preclude one from being a nerd!
Maybe the man needs a life, and hopefully the guy is not still living with his mother, but he does not need a pilot filing a report on him.