Slashdot Mirror
Off-Duty Police Officer Steals iPad From TSA Checkpoint
SpaceCadetTrav writes "A recent arrest report shows that an off-duty police officer from Fullerton, CA was arrested on felony grand theft charges for stealing an iPad at a TSA checkpoint in the Miami International Airport. The theft was captured on video surveillance last month and the officer was tracked down just before boarding her plane."
Looks like she thought she was employed by the TSA.
I read the arresting officer's police report via the link. In case you don't intend to (it's kind of boring), I think the highlight is the statement that upon seeing the IPad in the TSA bin, that she placed her bag of chicken over it. Aside from that, I guess any story with the word "IPad" and a photo of Steve Jobs is sure to be interesting to someone. So off-duty-police crime + IPad and Steve Jobs + Bag of Chicken is the combination that makes this story "interesting".
Gently reply
No surprise. Cops are people too, with all the usual failings.
At least this bad cop was arrested instead of "protecting their own", but let's see how he is prosecuted.
The fact that they are actually applying the law equally and not regarding the cop as above the law is the surprise.
If only they'd prosecute police brutality, corruption, and intimidation (particularly of anyone with a camera) with such fervency. Then they might stop looking so much like the thugs they're supposed to protect us from.
If that sounds too categorical, that's for a well-founded reason. The cops who don't abuse power themselves but keep silent when their co-workers do the same are equally guilty. They sometimes call it "the blue wall of silence". I call it the blue wall of cowardice. It is most unbecoming of such otherwise brave people.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Most of the thieves who work for the TSA are actually a lot more sophisticated than this idiot. My co-worker had a macbook pro stolen from him at the airport. He put one into his checked baggage and when he got it back inside he found the love letter from the TSA saying they had inspected the bag and no laptop. What we did find upon closer inspection was a small, but certainly noticeable incision on the top left corner of the bag. We hypothesize, though obviously cannot prove, that this was essentially a signal to the person who took the bag from the inspection point(where there are tons of cameras) to the loading dock for the plane. The area in between is bound to have significantly fewer cameras and is most likely where the theft took place. He complained to the TSA but got the standard note that they take things like this very seriously and how theft is very rare etc. Basically they said "sucks to be you" and he never heard from them again.
Monstar L
It's a cop from California who got caught doing the crime in Florida. That's why.
The cover-their-own stuff happens in other cases because they broke the rules in their own district, thus it's their own department, staffed by their own co-workers, that has the authority to go after them. Yeah, it sounds like a massive ethics violation to me, too. IMO, when a cop is accused of something, it should be the next higher layer up in charge of the investigation (local cop? state investigation. state cop? federal investigation. federal cop? federal investigation from a different part of the country.) There's a reason people ask "who watches the watchers?".
While checking through at the airport a few months back I was going through the standard scans. After placing my items in the bins (o so many bins, damn you electronic devices) I'm left to stand while they take a peek at my penis (to determine if it's worthy of flight).
The agent nearby asks me to keep an eye on my items as they pass through. I suppose if I'm busy watching my things they are free to do other things (like giggle at my pictures). I thought it was kinda odd because who in the right mind would dare defy the TSA under their noses. Still, nearly 20 seconds after the agent mentions me watching my belongings some chick snatches my ipad out of the bin and proceeds to start to walk off. Unfortunately, I can't leave my position of shame and I keep raising my voice while repeatedly saying, "HEY LADY, THAT IS MY IPAD." Eventually, when about 3 or 4 people are staring her down she sets in back in the bin and states she thought it was hers. Ignoring the fact that it was crammed between three other bins that had my possessions and I don't recall her actually picking up an ipad from her newly radioactive items.
In the end, I kept my things and the TSA laughed at my penis some more. Still, it's quite frightening how easy it really is to both nab someones things and then write off what you were attempting.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
http://travelunderground.org/index.php?threads/list-of-tsa-crime-stories-since-december-2010-part-1.127/
http://travelunderground.org/index.php?threads/list-of-tsa-crime-stories-since-december-2010-part-2.128/
Granted this one wasn't actually committed by a TSO but as was mentioned above, airport security checkpoints are prime locations for theft because many seem (or are) deliberately designed to separate you from your belongings.
Tip: You are NOT required to use a TSA-friendly lock to lock your carry-on bag. Keep your valuables inside your bag as it goes through the X-ray and lock it with a secure, TSA-unfriendly lock. If you want to take your laptop out as they insist you have to (many have said they've left the laptop in the bag and the TSA troglodytes haven't said anything about it), lock it to your bag handle with a Kensington locking cable. These steps will help ensure that you're there to watch them if they claim to need to look through your belongings. It also helps prevent them from trying to force you into a private room for a gropedown by picking your bags up and walking off with them.
And yeah, this is a shameless plug, but the site in my sig is a good resource for tracking TSA civil-rights abuses and coordinating political action to fight back against them. There's good advice to be had for putting TSOs in their place at the checkpoint too.
Help protect civil rights from abuse by the TSA - visit TSA News Blog.
http://www.tsanewsblog.com
It speaks about how even low IQ people crave for the single most innovative and powerful device thats bound to rewrite the complete history of computational devices. Obama farts? It's news if he have an iPad in his hand in the moment. Nuclear power plant flooding, is not news because nuclear power plants don't make/use iPads. Get with the program.
It also matters for anybody who travels with electronic devices. The TSA requires you to take your laptop (and tablet) out of your bag and put it on a little tray, out in the open and all by itself, to go through XRAY. Then you have to go through the scanner, so you're separated from your goods for a bit. I'm all for poo-poo'ing an obvious appeal to fanboism for link-bait, but you don't really think that's something important to know?
Okay, here's how it matters for iPad owners:
- You'll lose sight of it.
- Activate the 'find' feature.
- Don't go to airplane mode until you're on the flight.
And for non iPad owners, but owners of other tablets or laptops...
- You'll lose sight of your gadget.
- Encrypt your device.
- You should see if there's a built in GPS that can phone home.
Again, I'm annoyed with Slashdot's use of Apple stories to serve ads, but I just flew recently and I think there's definitely a lot of 'it matters' here to discuss. I'm lucky in that my iPad didn't walk away from me during the security screening. I wasn't too worried about it because it's the cellular version and I have the 'find me' option activated on it. I didn't realize this until this article came about, but I put the iPad on Airplane Mode before we went through security. That was dumb Dumb DUMB of me! The 'find me' option wouldn't work!
This thread could easily be salvaged.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think it's a matter of self-reliance, more of a matter of being intelligent enough to realize that the TSA is completely useless, a waste of tax dollars, and (as you said) rapes your constitutional rights.
However, I think most slashdotters are intelligent enough to realize that government is necessary. Nobody is or can be completely self-reliant. Good luck getting from California to New York without roads and bridges or airplanes, for example.
Most intelligent people realize that regulation is necessary. I see the occasional railing against the EPA, but these people are obviously too young to remember a US without the EPA. You young people can't imagine how dirty the air and public waterways were before the EPA. The air around a Monsanto plant was so toxic you literally could not breathe driving past one with your windows down (and few had AC in their cars back in those primitive times). Rivers and streams literally caught fire!
Government is necessary (but don't trust it). The TSA isn't.
The competent person is capable of feeding and housing himself
Not without help. You need land and tools to grow food, tools, labor, and materials to build a house on that land. You need society, and societies need governments. Anarchy results in monarchy.
Free Martian Whores!