***Reps. Manuse and Lambert on Fox News: NH Bill Will Make Pat Downs a Sexual Crime***
TSA body scans earn ire of lawmakers
By GARRY RAYNO, New Hampshire Union Leader Staff
CONCORD – Enhanced security measures at airports were described as tyranny, sexual assault and a violation of the Constitution’s prohibition against unreasonable search and seizure Tuesday.
Rep. George Lambert, R-Litchfield, the prime sponsor of a bill that would make the touching or viewing of a person’s breasts or genitals by a government security agent a sexual assault, asked: “At what point have we gone too far?”
Lambert and others said the measures the federal government have taken to prevent terrorist acts on airplanes eat away at freedom’s foundation and assume citizens are guilty.
However, several committee members noted the bill would make Transportation Security Administration agents sexual offenders.
HB 628 would require agents convicted of sexual assault to register for life as tier 3 sex offenders — the most serious classification.
Dr. Darren Tapp of Concord said because of airport security measures, he won’t fly at all, and it’s affected his career.
“I have given up my dream to be a successful mathematician because I will not give this consent,” he said.
He said the thought of an enhanced pat-down last year was enough to make him take the train home to his family instead of an airplane.
Tapp asked the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee to pass the bill “not just for me, but for the children so they will know that innocent until proven guilty is not just a nice idea.”
After the hearing on HB 628, committee member Rep. Laura Pantelakos, D-Portsmouth, told Tapp if he was upset at the airport, he can choose not to fly.
“The screeners are just doing their jobs and they shouldn’t be sex offenders. You should be seeking change at the federal level and not the state level,” she told Tapp.
Jeanmarie Pressutti of Concord said the enhanced procedures dehumanize people, just as sexual assault does.
“Things that happen today so infringe on our personal space and our personal rights,” she said.
She said screening agents use the threat of not letting a person fly in order to force people into full-body scans.
“I am one voice, but this country’s foundation was built on one voice at a time,” she told the committee.
Bill sponsor Rep. Andrew Manuse, R-Derry, called the new security procedures a slippery slope. “What’s next? Will they do body-cavity searches?” he asked, and noted he was told of a woman who lives with one of his constituents being strip-searched at Manchester-Boston Regional Airport.
“Where do you draw the line? … You do that any other place and it would be sexual assault,” Manuse said.
Pantelakos asked if the woman filed a complaint, and Manuse said if she didn’t, she should have. “You can’t treat innocent people like they are guilty,” he said. “The terrorists are winning.”
He presented a petition to the committee with 145 signatures supporting the bill. The petition was up only one day on the Republican Liberty Caucus web site, he said.
Another bill sponsor, Rep. Daniel Itse, R-Fremont, said “law enforcement officers should tell a citizen why the person is being searched. Randomly pulling someone out of line, or full-body screening everybody goes beyond the pale. That’s not what America is about. We’re surrendering our national character,” he said.
The committee did not make an immediate recommendation on the bill.
Pat-downs might make TSA felons
By KEVIN LANDRIGAN, Nashua Telegraph Staff Writer
CONCORD – Any government security worker viewing or touching someone’s private parts at airports would be a felon and wind up on the state’s Sexual Offender Registry for life under legislation a Litchfield Republican lawmaker tried to advance Tuesday.
Rep. George Lambert said the intense pat-downs, high-tech invasive screening machines and even the occasional strip search at the nation’s airports for security reasons have gotten out of control.
Lambert urged the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee that these “invasions of privacy” by the Transportation Safety Administration and other agencies must only occur if there is probable cause.
“We understand searching for weapons and searching for explosives,” Lambert began. “When we have citizens who are strip-searched and have no ability to leave under color of law, at what point have we gone too far? We need to protect our citizens from invasion that exceeds the limitation of the TSA security procedure.”
The bill attracted national attention Tuesday when The Drudge Report put it on its front page. This caused House spokespeople to field calls from many United States and foreign news outlets.
Darren Tapp said he took a train from Winchester, Ky., to Concord to visit family in December to avoid the invasive searches at the airport.
This came after he became offended during a similar trip in 2009, when a TSA worker touched his quadricep.
Tapp said he’s given up his career dream of being a mathematician because, facing this level of personal scrutiny, he refuses to fly.
“The mania of trying to impose an impossible goal has killed one person’s dreams,” said Tapp, who lives in Concord.
“You may accuse me of being a dreamer, but I can imagine a day when we can tell our children that presumed innocent is not just a nice idea but a concept we have incorporated throughout our society.”
The bill (HB 628) makes it a sexual assault either to touch or view with a state-of-the-art body scanner someone’s breast or genitalia without probable cause. Upon conviction, the security worker becomes a Tier III sex offender.
Gina Marie Presutti of Manchester said these scanners dehumanize people.
“I feel the things that are happening today are so infringing on our personal space and our personal rights,” Presutti testified. “It is such a slippery slope that is being taken right now.”
No one appeared to testify against the bill. Several members of the committee that heard the bill questioned if it went much too far.
Rep. Steve Shurtleff, D-Concord, is a retired deputy U.S. marshal.
“Somebody working at a metal detector at Hillsborough County Superior Court South in Nashua merely suspects there is a weapon and then does a hand-held wand search. With this bill, they could be charged with a felony,” Shurtleff said. “Isn’t that more than a little excessive?”
Rep. Gene Charron, R-Chester, said federal law would appear to prevent the state from dictating what the TSA can or can’t do.
Rep. Laura Pantelakos, D-Rockingham, said Americans understand that when they want to board a plane, they first must surrender some of their personal privacy.
After the hearing, an angry and loud Tadd confronted Pantelakos about her views.
Rep. David Welch, R-Kingston, also said the bill scapegoats law enforcement.
“This bill doesn’t answer it; it doesn’t solve the problem in my estimation. This takes the person giving answers, and following orders of his job, and makes him the criminal,” Welch said.
Manchester-Boston Regional Airport Deputy Director J. Brian O’Neill attended the hearing.
“We’re just monitoring this,” O’Neill said.
Manchester-Boston Regional Airport doesn’t have an advanced image scanner, but the airport does use pat-downs.
Passengers can be subject to a pat-down if an alarm is set off or if they’re randomly chosen.
Rep. Andrew Manuse, R-Derry, said 145 people signed a Republican Liberty Caucus petition supporting the bill.
“Maybe this will tell them at TSA that New Hampshire means business. We don’t want this type of thing to go on in our state. We’re saying stop, don’t do it any more,” Manuse said.
“With these procedures … I think the terrorists are winning. They are destroying our country, and we are saying what liberties are we defending?”
No state has passed such a law, though there has been unrest in Congress about the unauthorized release of TSA images on the Internet.
The U.S. Senate last fall approved making it a federal crime to share TSA images with anyone.
Last fall, Meg McLain, of Keene, said she was brought to tears when she refused a full-body scan at an airport in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. She refused to submit to a pat-down and ended up flying out of an airport in Tallahassee that did not use these scanners.
Here are some other media reports on this issue:
WMUR: Bill Would Make Some Airport Screening Sexual Assault
NECN: Bill would put more scrutiny on airport screeners
WHDH-TV: NH proposal would make some TSA exams a crime
AOL Travel: New Hampshire Legislators Propose Bill to Make Pat-Downs a Crime
WMUR video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9Eu3PO6_myk
Smarter Travel: NH Bill Would Make TSA Pat Down a Sex Crime
World Net Daily: States to federal gov’t: Stop feeling up fliers!
Free Talk Live: My interview begins about seven eighths of the way through.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
“This bill doesn’t answer it; it doesn’t solve the problem in my estimation. This takes the person [TSA Agent] giving answers, and following orders of his job, and makes him the criminal,” Welch said.
Yes, Mr. Welch. This bill does make the [TSA agent] a criminal. But keep in mind that ALL US air travelers have also been criminalized, as well as being victimized & often sexually assaulted by the TSA’s own procedures & rules. So what is to be done???
I applaud New Hampshire for upholding innocent until proven guilty and for upholding the Fourth Amendment. Now all they need to do is somehow make sure that people wearing medical metal aren’t assaulted on every part of their bodies for the mere reason they have a medical assistive device. On this I speak from extensive (but former: I also have stopped flying) experience: I have yet to meet anyone that can explain just exactly why demonstrable metal between my knee and ankle requires a full, humiliating, invasive, intrusive and dehumanizing pat-down. Anyone???
{ 1 trackback }