RSS56 Year Old Claire Hirschkind, Alledged Rape Victim & Pacemaker Device in Chest Arrested by TSA for Refusing Pat Down
56 year old Claire Hirschkind, rape victim and pacemaker-like device implant airline passenger pushed to the floor, handcuffed and arrested for refusing to be patted down. The TSA continuing their ridiculous, non-profiling ways as they treat no passengers with dignity and respect.
Early Wednesday morning, a computer glitch shut down a security checkpoint for a couple of hours at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. The line snaked out the door as many travelers waited for more than an hour and some missed their flights. One of the first people in line after that shutdown never made it through. She was arrested and banned from the airport.
Claire Hirschkind, 56, who says she is a rape victim and who has a pacemaker-type device implanted in her chest, says her constitutional rights were violated. She says she never broke any laws. But the Transportation Security Administration disagrees.
Hirschkind was hoping to spend Christmas with friends in California, but she never made it past the security checkpoint.
“I can’t go through because I have the equivalent of a pacemaker in me,” she said.
Hirschkind said because of the device in her body, she was led to a female TSA employee and three Austin police officers. She says she was told she was going to be patted down.
“I turned to the police officer and said, ‘I have given no due cause to give up my constitutional rights. You can wand me,’” and they said, ‘No, you have to do this,’” she said.
Hirschkind agreed to the pat down, but on one condition.
“I told them, ‘No, I’m not going to have my breasts felt,’ and she said, ‘Yes, you are,’”said Hirschkind.
When Hirschkind refused, she says that “the police actually pushed me to the floor, (and) handcuffed me. I was crying by then. They drug me 25 yards across the floor in front of the whole security.”
The TSA did release a statement Wednesday that said, “Our officers are trained to treat all passengers with dignity and respect. Security is not optional.” Now that’s rich. Maybe the TSA would like to ask 61 year old, bladder cancer patient Thomas D. “Tom” Sawyerwho they humiliated by breaking his urostomy bag.
A retired special education teacher on his way to a wedding in Orlando, Fla., said he was left humiliated, crying and covered with his own urine after an enhanced pat-down by TSA officers recently at Detroit Metropolitan Airport.
“I was absolutely humiliated, I couldn’t even speak,” said Thomas D. “Tom” Sawyer, 61, of Lansing, Mich.
Sawyer is a bladder cancer survivor who now wears a urostomy bag, which collects his urine from a stoma, or opening in his stomach. “I have to wear special clothes and in order to mount the bag I have to seal a wafer to my stomach and then attach the bag. If the seal is broken, urine can leak all over my body and clothes.”
The TSA certainly treated this 3 year old girl with dignity and respect as she screamed, “sop touching me.” Then of course there was all the dignity in the world shown by the TSA to Cathy Bossi, a cancer survivor flight attendant forced to remove her prosthetic breast during a TSA groping.
Posted December 25, 2010 by Scared Monkeys Arrest, Civil Rights, Fourth Amendment, Home Land Security, TSA, US Constitution, US National Security, War on Terror, We the People, WTF | 12 comments |
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12 Responses to “56 Year Old Claire Hirschkind, Alledged Rape Victim & Pacemaker Device in Chest Arrested by TSA for Refusing Pat Down”
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Hirschkind has a lawsuit in the making. The 4th Amendment protects American Citizens against unreasonable search and seizure of their papers and persons without probable cause. As Hirschkind said, she did nothing that gave TSA probable cause.
That’s why I’m not flying.
Only when Payday stops and people refuse to fly will this nonsense stop. Duh!
Perhaps between vacations and obvious photo-ops,Mr Obama has not had time to keep up with the mundane national news. Could someone please tell him that the TSA has granted itself supreme power over American citizens and he might want to do something about it before there is a revolution in airports around the country.
BTW – I understand that the ‘first family’ flew commercial to Hawaii – can someone please release the video of them being patted down? How do we know that one of them didn’t have a bomb tucked into their underwear?
[...] Scared Monkeys highlights yet another grabby arresty TSA issue [...]
Guess I’ll be returning the penile implant Santa left under the tree.
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SM: Alrighty then.
R
Don’t be so quick to condemn the TSA. I saw this woman interviewed and there is something off about her story. She’s clearly jonesing for a lawsuit and a payday. She refused to go through the screening because of her constitutional rights. There is no constitutional right to fly. If she wants to fly, she needs to follow the rules. I’m also curious what medical device is “equivalent to a pacemaker”, but maybe that info will come out when she files her billion dollar lawsuit against the TSA, USA, and airline for violating her civil rights. yawn.
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SM: The TSA can handle the low hanging fruit. They have no idea how to handle the more complicated situations. Also, sorry but we should be profiling, not randomly treating everyone like they are a terrorist.
R
Re #7: I agree with both of you. The TSA should definitely be profiling, and hopefully one day soon they will. In the meantime, they have to operate under the parameters they’re given, and I think they’re doing a remarkable job. I fly fairly often, and I’ve never been treated with anything other than consideration and professionalism by the TSA folks. I’ve never seen them act in any other manner. I would also like to know what is equivalent to a pacemaker. The only thing I can think of is a defibrillator, but surely she would have called it that. It’s difficult for me to believe that this lady was suddenly thrown to the ground and handcuffed for no good reason.
Could someone check the spam folder for a response I made to this posting? It seems to have disappeared, and I’m not sure if it’s something I did or the Spaminator ate it. Thanks!
(klaasend)
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SM: Got it out of spam
Re: SM response to my previous comment (#7): I have absolutely no problem with profiling. I would institute it tomorrow if it were my choice to make. Unfortunately, the obligatory challenges by ACLU, CAIR, etc make profiling a pipe dream. Until such time when profiling can be done, we all need to follow the rules. I agree with Elmer. I typically fly through the busiest of airports (ORD and LGA) and have never been treated rudely or disrespectfully. That said, I have always treated the agents in kind which I suspect was lacking in Ms. Hirschkind’s case.
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SM: Sully, the majority of folks are not or should I say better not have an issue going through TDA screening. If that occurred our airports would be backed up out every door. The problem is not folks like you, the low hanging friut, the problem is the extreme cases.
You ask what it will take, sadly another plane used as a missile by Muslim terrorists.
Here is my issue in the grand scope. The Homeland Security folks impliment taking shoes off, naked scans, pat downs, thermoses because they hear “CHATTER”. That “CHATTER” comes from Muslims yet they are not being overtly screened. Make sense?
R
SM: Not to split hairs, but I never asked “what it will take”. I don’t disagree with you at all about profilinge. However, assuming that it is not immediately possible due to court challenges and/or the inept Eric Holder we may as well live with the inconvenience of screening. I hate that the TSA agents who have a tough job are the subject of travelers’ wrath when they are only trying to do their job. Good dialogue, though.
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SM: Not really disagreeing with you either. However, much like on Sept 11, 2001 … PC will be the death of us.
Holder is one of the biggest screw ups that has ever held the office. Then again, look who his president is. Water seeks its own level.
My personal belief is that Obama will strip search a 90 year old grandma if it means 100% overkill. He is caught between a Barack and a hard place. One, he is a bed wetting liberal who can’t have profiling even though its the right thing to do. Obama also cannot have a terrorist attack occur. If one does, he is finsiahed as most all look at him as weak on terrorism.
R
[...] granny’s in wheel chairs, individuals with limb prosthesis, the elderly, those with pacemakers and now …Welcome to the latest folks who are considered terrorists and guilty until proven [...]