Originally Posted by law dawg (Post 11713714)

A cop looked at a bottle without permission. I'm not going to rank that up their with Darfur, if that's what you mean.

It was poorly done and beyond the pale. It was not a moral outrage nor a travesty. Had he beat you down to get the bottle away from you I would respond more vehemently. As it was - there are worse things that I see fairly often that warrant more of a response from me than that. Sorry.

Originally Posted by AngryMiller (Post 11716591)

Law Dawg, I used to work with a guy who was on the reserve police officer force of Mesquite, Tx. One Monday, he came to work and said that he'd given a beating to a lippy hippy. I asked him what he'd attempted to do in the course of that beating and his response was "teach him a lesson." My reply to that was, "all you've succeeded in doing is to forever make him, his friends, and family distrust/hate all police officers." He pretty much stopped talking to me after that. Some police officers do commit excesses in real life that would be better left to Hollywood fantasy.

Originally Posted by PoliceStateSurvivor (Post 11716551)

Here is the problem. How do I know the difference between you making a friendly conversation or a fishing expedition trying to pin something on me? How do I know that I don't fit some vague description of some suspect? And, worst of all, how do I know that you are a "good" as opposed to "bad" cop who might try to shake me down? The latter did happen in a Polish community in Chicago. Cops were shaking down legal immgrants threatening to deport them.

Originally Posted by AngryMiller (Post 11716591)

Law Dawg, I used to work with a guy who was on the reserve police officer force of Mesquite, Tx. One Monday, he came to work and said that he'd given a beating to a lippy hippy. I asked him what he'd attempted to do in the course of that beating and his response was "teach him a lesson." My reply to that was, "all you've succeeded in doing is to forever make him, his friends, and family distrust/hate all police officers." He pretty much stopped talking to me after that. Some police officers do commit excesses in real life that would be better left to Hollywood fantasy.

Originally Posted by PoliceStateSurvivor (Post 11716933)

This is precisely why it is very important to take even minor excesses with the utmost seriousness. That is, we the citizens, should report them, and the appropriate levels of supervision must act prompty with proper discipline.

Without accountability, minor excesses tend to become major very quickly.

Originally Posted by PoliceStateSurvivor (Post 11716551)

Here is the problem. How do I know the difference between you making a friendly conversation or a fishing expedition trying to pin something on me?

Originally Posted by Bart (Post 11722355)

I agree!

Problem is, with respect to TSA checkpoint screening, that many do not report these matters for a variety of reasons. I'm a big advocate of reporting these types of incidents and have posted such in this forum on many occasions. Problem is that there are many who either refuse (thinking that just a verbal is sufficient) or who are so skeptical that they think it's not worth the effort.

Feedback works.

Originally Posted by Bart (Post 11723137)

It has been a long time since I posted one of my often-repeated recommendations, so here it goes:

Why not report it through the airline station manager? It is easier to obtain a comment card and/or email address through the airline to post your concerns, not to mention that you can do it at your leisure while at the departure gate or aboard the flight.

When the station manager passes it to TSA, the issue is not only the specific incident itself, but there's also the working relationship the FSD has to maintain with the local airline, so there's a vested interest for all parties concerned. There's also a matter of credibility, too. I don't think any respectable station manager would pass along a complaint that has no validity. So it works in the best interest of all parties.

There's also a web site, as I understand it, where passengers can go online to post their concerns. I don't know if it's a cyber version of the complaint form; however, I do know that it's no longer an email address which had a tendency to either get backlogged or stuck in the queue until the addressee finally answered the mail.

Lots of choices other than leaving a comment card at the checkpoint. However, I still recommend leaving a comment card at the checkpoint because it allows the supervisor to do something about it promptly. Otherwise, the complaint will eventually make it back but without the specifics of who did what, and that makes it difficult for supervisors to take any corrective action.

Your choice, pal.