They would learn very quickly how to identify and steal the good stuff.

I think yyzvoyageur summed up the answer you are looking for pmocek. I gave answers, you either just blatantly missed them or did not connect the dots that they were directed at your questions. I'm pretty sure I said I want to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures just as much as the next person. In fact, I'm positive I said it, so I'm not sure how you imply I'm ignoring your questions. I also stated that you believe checkpoint searches are "unreasonable" and violating 4th Amendment rights of those who are arrested with illegal items aside from weapons. I disagreed and stated why. I don't know what else you are looking for. As far as your other questions regarding copyright infringement or unvaccinated animals, I pretty sure I gave my opinion about reporting illegal items where criminal are using air travel to transport or facilitate their activity (drug money being one of them).

Here is the main difference between you and I that we will never see eye to eye on. First, TSA doesn't test drugs. Their policy would simply be to call law enforcement to the checkpoint. I would pull the individual away and test the substance, not TSA. The bags of the passenger would be thoroughly searched and then the TSA goes on to the next passenger while we deal with the one with the possible cocaine. See, you want to give the passenger "the benefit of the doubt" and believe it is not an illegal drug. You give them the green light to take their drugs onto the plane and encourage and/or facilitate their drug-use and/or drug sales. You don't have a problem with druggies taking their drugs on commercial aircraft. I do, and I'm glad the higher courts agree with me.

Whether it is a police officer or TSA, it is a search none the less. Just because the original idea behind security checkpoints at airports was to specifically look for items that are dangerous to the planes and passengers, I would like to think that those who wrote the original laws/mandates had in mind that they would not turn a blind eye to contraband found during said screening/searches.

To be short and sweet, you are simply ok with anything illegal coming through the checkpoint as long as it is not an immediate threat to the passengers and aircraft. It doesn't matter to you of the repercussions of those items getting where they are going. It doesn't matter to you that you want to help facilitate criminal activity. You believe that the rights of the American public are being stripped away and the security checkpoints are the front door to start such activity. I disagree. While some policies the TSA have implemented since their inception have been lacking common-sense, nothing at the checkpoints or ticket counters have changed when it comes to the searches themselves. There has always been random screening, there has always been secondary screens when people set off the WTMD, and there have always been secondary screens when items could not be resolved on xrays. For some reason you and others think TSA has extended their powers and now looking for anyone they believe is a criminal in any aspect. Screeners have always reported possible drugs that were discovered during checkpoint searches and private screeners also reported large sums of cash. Maybe this is new to you and other FTers, but it has been going on long before TSA was created.

So rather than blame the morons who pack their drugs into the bag where there is a likelihood they would be discovered, we should blame the ones finding it because they are violating the drug dealers rights by finding the drugs instead of the weapons during a search for weapons.

I do not want to create checkpoints on our sidewalks and roadways because I know the good majority of the citizens living in our country are law abiding and I believe they should not have to suffer the inconveniences of our checkpoints on their streets to look for a few scumbags. Before you get too excited from that statement, I have a different view about airport security checkpoints. For the greater good and safety of commercial aviation, security checkpoints will always be a part of flying. For the greater good and safety of commercial aviation, drugs and other illegal items that benefit from going from point A to point B (quickly) should not go unreported because it gives the green light to all the turds to use air travel to help spread and/or facilitate the illegal activity.

In this thread, we are heading into the direction of what should or should not be reported. Many here forget to realize that in reality, when coming through security, if TSA observes something that they believe is illegal, they notify LE (by their policy), who is either immediately on-site or minutes away (as with some airports). The disposition is immediate of whether the item is illegal and/or if prosecution is even going to be pursued. A lot of the times it is not.

I feel we are starting to go in circles here. 99% of the items I am called to the same items LEOs were called to 10 years ago: illegal and/or artfully concealed drugs, large sums of cash, and prohibited weapons. The reporting has not spread out to other items up to and including digital media and animals.

On a side-note about the powdered filled condoms, I can't believe that they had a drug-test kit test positive for cocaine on flour. There are definitely times people should win lawsuits and this was one of them. Even after we field test, we sent our results to the crime lab and I'm sure many other agencies do. You have to admit though how many people fill condoms with flour? Normally they are filled and inserted into not-so-fun places to get past such areas as checkpoints and/or searches.

Bingo. I also think they should not be stopping people to have pipes tested, powders analyzed, nude models identified, pets' vaccinations verified, or permission to copy data like DVDs verified. Each of these could lead to an arrest of someone who has done wrong, and none is something that TSA should get involved with.

Phil, have you heard back on your FOIA request?

I just got a reply to this one I file on the OIG complaint I filed over the summer. (edited for brevity)

This was their reply. (edited for brevity)

It is truly sad when the TSA can't even find documents identified by their own tracking numbers.

So you think it's unreasonable to stop drug smugglers, crack pipe owners, child pornographers, copyright violators, undocumented immigrants, parking ticket scofflaws, and other criminals, just because a bunch of honest people will be stopped for a moment? If you were given the opportunity to stop everyone and find all those criminals, you'd just let them walk away instead?


This is the first time I've seen the 4th Amendment mentioned in this discussion. I think that stopping everyone who travels via the only means that is feasible in most situations to search them for anything that indicates they might have done wrong is unreasonable.

1) You're changing the subject again. There's no way that TSA bag checkers can tell that most things are illegal; we're talking about suspected illegal items -- those that are sometimes legal, sometimes illegal, like white powder, glass tubes, pictures of naked people, and pets. In each of those cases, there's a chance that the item indicates wrongdoing, and there's a chance that it does not. In almost every circumstance (short of a severed head in a bag) all the have is their suspicion. I think that TSA bag checkers should assume people are innocent of such crimes, and you seem to think that they should assume that people are guilty and hold those people and their belongings until police arrive. 2) if you're confident that you already gave your opinion and it's too much of an inconvenience to restate it, please link to it so I can read it.

Of course. They don't test any substances, suspected of being drugs or not. What they do is see something completely unrelated to the few things we have allowed them to search us for because we have been so scared by their threats of violence, then stop the presumed-innocent-in-eyes-of-law person, restricting his freedom of movement.

Sure I do. Same as I think that when a nudie mag, a homemade DVD, a pet without clear indication of vaccination, or someone with brown skin is found, TSA should leave it, him, or her, alone and move on to searching for dangerous things. It's unreasonable for them to assume that they are likely to have caught a child pornographer, copyright violator, transporter of unvaccinated pets, or undocumented immigrant. In each case, they should move on to looking for dangerous things and leave the law enforcement up to law enforcement agencies.

We wouldn't put up with TSA's crap if they made it clear that they're searching for anything that looks like it might indicate wrongdoing. We let them do what they do because they have threatened that violence will occur if they are not allowed to conduct their searches "for dangerous items".

If you want to stop everyone at the airport, train depot, bus depot, highway entrance ramp, or sidewalk to look for all of the above and it's your understanding that it would be constitutional for you to do so, by all means, try to do so -- you'll probably catch some criminals. I suspect our legislative branch's check on our executive branch would kick in and stop you.

You're putting words in my mouth again.

Do you have a problem with "druggies" taking their drugs on our highways? If not, why are you letting them instead of stopping them and arresting them?

Uh... yeah.

Why, then, do you suppose they specifically allowed TSA to search for weapons, explosives, and incendiary devices, instead of simply having them search for anything that they feel is significant?

You got me there. I agree. Are you similarly okay with anything illegal coming through our highway system, rail system, or sidewalks?

Not that I have any reason to believe you, but you specifically said that TSA is required to do so.

I never suggested otherwise. Besides, it's irrelevant to this discussion.


Do you or do you not think that airport checkpoints should be used to check people for ill-gotten gains, pipes that contain residue of controlled substances, un-vaccinated pets, pornography depicting 17.5-year-olds, digital media players with data obtained via copyright violation, etc.? I've asked you repeatedly, and you still haven't answered. Just check 'yes' or 'no'.


Is that the only reason? Because it would be an inconvenience? So what if the search happened nearly instantaneously; say it was a massively-efficient remote viewer similar to TSA's virtual strip search machines, but with another couple decades of improvement. Then would you think it was a good idea? I'm asking if it would be a good idea if it did not inconvenience the law abiding majority.

But you'll just ignore the potential greater good of all other modes of transportation? Why do you feel so strongly that we should give criminals a free pass on our rails, streets, and sidewalks?

No, we're already there. You say you think anything that indicates possibility of wrongdoing should be reported. I say that is almost everything, and that by simply reporting it, TSA is punishing those who are found with it. I say they should keep looking for dangerous items and not use information gained in their search as reason to conduct an even more intrusive investigation.

Our resident TSA TSO, Dean, says otherwise. He says they only notify law enforcement of some things that they suspect to be illegal, and that they look the other way when they find other things that they suspect to be illegal.

TSA itself contradicts your statement. Most of the "wins" they report are cases of having discovered stolen credit cards, controlled substances, and immigrations violators.

You wrote:

I responded:

Then I asked again, but you still have not answered. Look, there's no use debating whether TSA is conducting a dragnet operation or not if we define "dragnet" differently. For the purpose of this discussion, what do you think a dragnet is?

I asked:

You didn't answer. When they see those pictures, there's a chance that the person is a child pornographer. Do you think they should just let him walk away? Why do you want to facilitate child pornography by letting suspected child pornographers jet around our airspace?

Some, and the number is growing, computer programs are distributed on DVD's.

My apologies for not being specific! I meant, like, movie DVDs. Not PC-DVDs like what you'd get with most of the big games out these days, like Dark Messiah of Might and Magic or Turning Point: The Fall of Liberty.

Unless those count, too. We still talking about the same thing?

Personally, I'd say both statements are correct. If there is a policy regarding us notifying something to law enforcement, we do. If not, we don't.

I think Sgt. Scott was just speaking in broad, general terms for the notification of law enforcement to the checkpoint.

It's just speculation since it's never happened here in HSV to my knowledge, but stories about things like stolen credit cards and immigration violators I'd be willing to bet had some kind of base in the TDC procedures � someone trying to pass off a fake ID or something and having LE notified (as a result of that), and then LE discovering later that the person was in possession of stolen credit cards or an immigration violator.

I'm not terribly sure what really happens after law enforcement is notified, as TSA (or at least I am, as a rank-and-file TSO) is quite effectively out of the picture once the LEO takes the situation.

Here's the stupid thing about immigration violators. TSA has supposedly caught illegals that were going home to their home countries. So what does DHS do? Takes them into custody, gives them a deportation hearing and deports them. Maybe throw in some jail time too.

It'd make much more sense to let them go home. They're not getting back in by plane.

I'm not saying all are going home, but if they are, DHS needs to just let them go instead of wasting tons of time and money to get the same result.

Fraudulent documents are easy enough to come by in some parts of the world; they'll be back.

Today, I received a copy of TSA operational directive 400-54-2 (300-54-20 was the wrong number) from the TSA FOIA office. It states:

Note that Bob at the TSA blog quoted a slightly abbreviated version of this on December 31, 2008, in the comments for their "Blogger Roundtable at TSA HQ with Secretary Chertoff and Administrator Hawley" post.

I'm happy to provide a copy of the documents I received from the TSA FOIA office to anyone who wants them.

We need to push Janet to change this.

Repeat after me: Cash in ANY amount is NOT contraband.

If possible would you PM me and drop off a copy please?

I asked for similar info and have not received a response.

Thanks.

This thread just got interesting again.

P.S. "nationwide consistency"

I can understand how the dog can be trained to identify the smell of ink but to determine if the cash is greater than AUS$10,000 is absolutely amazing.

I mean regular people have trouble keeping up with exchange rates but for a dog to be able to count that high just mind blowing, especially if it is a Labrador which are usually as dumb as the lamp post it urinates on.

Now if it was a cash sniffing cat, well then I could understand it...