Retired cop claims TSA pat downs are fake, purely for show

A retired Baltimore cop who conducted thousands of frisk searches on suspects during his career says that TSA pat downs are fake and do nothing to increase the security of Americans.

In comments made to the AOL owned blog Huffington Post ^[2], Robert Yamin said “I have been through TSA security about 40 times since 9/11. I have only been properly searched once.”

“It’s like a circus,” Yamin noted, claiming that the pat-downs are pure security theater and that Americans are frisked in such a fashion only to make it appear as if security has been stepped up in the nation’s airports.

Yamin says that the majority of TSA agents do not want to properly search travelers because they are fully aware of what it entails.

“To really search you must basically but gently grab the testicles and feel if there is something hidden there,” the retired cop states.

Yamin contends that the TSA pat-downs do not accomplish anything, and that abolishing the agency wouldn’t make flying any less safe. He contends that the current system of airport security feeds on fear and paranoia, treating Americans as if they are criminals for no practical purpose.

He also noted that any real terrorist would be fully aware of how to bypass the security theater and be capable of sneaking weapons through TSA security lines.

Yamin contends that if concealed against the upper thigh or under the testicles, “An agent would never notice or feel [the hidden weapons].”

While Yamin raises some salient points here, however, it is clear that in many cases TSA agents are indeed aggressively groping the genitals of travelers.

Indeed, as we recently revealed, TSA agents have been trained to use two different methods of pat-downs.

Consumer Traveler’s Charlie Leocha reported ^[3], “When meeting with privacy officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and TSA…. I was told unofficially that there were two standards of pat-downs. One for the normal situation where passengers are going through metal detectors and a different pat-down for those who refuse to go through the whole-body scanners.”

“With this latest announcement, TSA admits that it has been clandestinely punishing passengers for refusing to go through the invasive whole-body scans with an even more intrusive aggressive pat-down and that soon those more invasive pat-down will creep from airport to airport,” adds Leocha.

Further evidence of this policy was revealed two weeks ago ^[4], in the case of TSA screener John W. Irwin, who pleaded guilty to one count of grand larceny after he stole $520 dollars from a man as a punishment for the man complaining about his invasive pat down.

During the case it was revealed that the TSA had admitted it punished travelers who opt out of the body scanner with more invasive pat downs.

During the height of the national op-out day backlash against the TSA in 2010, the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg was told ^[5] directly by a TSA agent that pat downs were made increasingly invasive not for any genuine security reason, but to make the experience so uncomfortable for the traveler that they would be forced to use the body scanner.

TSA agents are also admittedly using pat downs as a form of punishment for travelers who exhibit a “bad attitude”.

As we reported last month ^[6], a TSA screener admitted to a woman traveling through Houston Airport that she was prevented from boarding her flight for retaliatory reasons as punishment for a bad attitude rather than any genuine security threat, after the woman refused to allow TSA agents to test her drink for explosives.

Journalists who have been critical of the TSA have also been targeted for reprisals. CNN reporter Drew Griffin was also put on a TSA watch list ^[7] immediately after he filed reports critical of the organization back in 2008.

Infowars is launching the national Opt Out and Film Week during Thanksgiving, November 19-26. Click here ^[8] for more details or click here ^[9] for the campaign’s Facebook page.

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Steve Watson is the London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com ^[10], and Prisonplanet.com ^[1]. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham in England.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/pat-down-expert-tsa-procedures-are-like-a-circus.html/print/