TSA Is Making Airport Valets Search Your Trunk
And legal experts say the searches may violate your Fourth Amendment rights.
—By Dana Liebelson
| Fri Jul. 26, 2013 3:00 AM PDT
239
Sergey/Flickr
A New York woman who valeted her car at Greater Rochester International Airport recently returned to find a notice on her car informing her that it had been searched without her consent. Furious, she got in touch with a local TV station, and the story went viral. TSA quickly put out a statement saying that its agents don't search cars—but searches can be included in a TSA-approved security plan. Mother Jones has found that not only does TSA approve searches of the trunks and interior of unattended cars in an undefined perimeter that's considered dangerously close to the airport—like a car left with valet parking—but if a valet attendant finds illegal drugs instead of bombs, they will call the police. Privacy experts say these searches could be a violation of a person's Fourth Amendment rights.
"We search every car, we open the trunk and take a look around," says Saour Merwan, a keymaster at the valet service at San Diego International Airport. "We were told by airport authority to do that, since about two years ago. [We] keep an eye out for something suspicious, like wires and cables. The airport has security regulations and we have to follow them." Merwan says the service doesn't inform anyone that they're checking out the inside of the vehicles, and when asked what he'd do if he found illegal drugs, he says, "Of course we'd call the police."
"This is exactly what the Fourth Amendment was designed to say the government can't do, generally search everything without suspicion," says Fred H. Cate, a professor at the Maurer School of Law at Indiana University. "At the same time, the Supreme Court has made an exception to searching items that you've voluntarily given to someone else—like a car. It's a crazy argument, but that's not bothered the courts before."
As David Castelveter, a spokesman for TSA explains, each airport in the United States is required to come up with a TSA-approved plan to deal with security risks. That includes "unattended vehicles parked curbside at the terminal." Approved measures to deal with that risk can include "searches of cars queued for curbside valet parking." (Not all airports have valet services, but those that do tend to leave the cars in lots close to the airport.) Mother Jones asked Castelveter whether the definition of "curbside" can include any parking lot close to the airport—including those that may contain locked, non-valet cars—but he said TSA looks at each airport security plan on a "case-by-case basis." Obviously, valet cars are easier to search than other vehicles, as the valet company has the keys.
"If TSA is made aware that evidence of illegal activity is discovered incidental to a search for explosives, that information will be relayed to law enforcement," Castelveter adds.
Advertise on MotherJones.com
The airports Mother Jones contacted didn't all handle valet car searches the same way. At the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, valet parking is underneath the terminal, so a security guard does a quick trunk search when the drivers are in the car. The same thing happens at Nashville International and at Logan Airport in Boston. As Richard Walsh, a spokesman for Massachusetts Port Authority explains, "If a driver does not wish to participate in this procedure, he/she will be directed to park in the central garage." An attendant for the valet at San Francisco International Airport said "yes, we can search" before changing his mind and adding "we just check the outside of the car. We just take down license plates. I'm not allowed to give you an answer." At Los Angeles International Airport, the valet attendants open the trunk to search for valuables that might be stolen while the person is gone, and list them on a piece of paper, but don't "look for specific stuff" related to security, according to an attendant.
The problem, from a privacy perspective, occurs when cars are searched without the driver's consent. "If you pop your trunk, you've consented to the government looking into your car, and you've waived your Fourth Amendment right," says Ben Wizner, the director of ACLU's speech, privacy & technology project. "But no court has ever indicated that TSA can conduct unwarranted searches, without suspicion, for anything other than explosives at the checkpoints where people are actually getting on the plane...this raises serious constitutional questions."
Castelveter says the searches do not violate the Fourth Amendment, because they fall under TSA's authority to search for explosives. He also says that a sign is placed at each valet booth alerting drivers of the search (the Rochester woman claims a sign wasn't there.) Karl Manheim, a professor at the Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, says the presence of a sign would make this an easier case for TSA to win, as "It could be said that the valet customer consents to the search by leaving the car at curbside with notice that it may be subject to search." But Wizner argues that the presence of a sign doesn't make it any more constitutional.
"Why not just put a sign on the street saying any time you leave your car, the government can search it?" he says. "This is just more TSA mission creep, first it's keeping weapons off planes, then keeping a safe perimeter around airports, and then all of a sudden, you have justification for searching cars in front of any building, anywhere."
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/tsa-car-searches-airport-fourth-a...This one is Mother Jones so Srinath can't debate it. Valet parked cars searched under TSA regulations
Posted at: 07/17/2013 6:46 PM | Updated at: 07/18/2013 3:30 PM
By: Berkeley Brean | WHEC.com
Bookmark and Share Print Story
Rochester, N.Y. -- She says she had no warning that someone was going to search her car after she left to catch her flight. So the woman contacted News10NBC.
We found out it happened to her because she valet parked her car. Those are the only cars that get inspected.
So if security feels it is necessary to search some cars in the name of safety, why not search all of them?
Laurie Iacuzza walked to her waiting car at the Greater Rochester International Airport after returning from a trip and that's when she found it -- a notice saying her car was inspected after she left for her flight. She said, “I was furious. They never mentioned it to me when I booked the valet or when I picked up the car or when I dropped it off.”
Iacuzza's car was inspected by valet attendants on orders from the TSA. But why only valet parked cars? That's what News10NBC wanted to ask the TSA director about. We reached him by phone.
Berkeley Brean asked, “Are the cars in the short term lots and long term lots getting searched as well?”
John McCaffery, TSA, said, “No, those vehicles that are in the garage, short term long term parking, even if they carry pretty large amounts of explosives, they would not cause damage to the front of the airport. But for those who use the valet, the car could be there for a half hour or an hour so there is a vulnerability.”
News10NBC went to the valet parking and one of the attendants showed us the notice they put in the cars.
We asked, “You're required, they tell you, you have to search the car?” Valet Parking Attendant Frank Dettorre said, “I have to do it.”
We also noticed a large sign that alerts customers that their vehicle will be inspected. The sign is on the kiosk window. Iacuzza says it was not there when she dropped off her car. “I think the public should be aware of the fact that if their car is going to be searched, they should be informed of it.”
Iacuzza said she doesn't mind the security measure. She just wants to be told if her car is getting searched.
News10NBC asked the owner of the company that runs the valet parking when they put up the sign but he wouldn't answer.
TSA says this is part of its overall security plan and that it's a proactive move. The attendants said they've only been doing it for about a month.
http://www.whec.com/news/stories/S3101080.shtml?cat=566TSA Warns Travelers May Be Arrested, Detained, and Fined for Refusing Search
In response to growing outrage over naked body scanners and intrusive pat down searches of the private parts of air travelers, the TSA is warning Americans that they may be arrested and fined $11,000 if they refuse to cooperate with the agency’s invasive and humiliating techniques.
The TSA warns that any “would-be commercial airline passenger” who enters an airport checkpoint and refuses to be subjected to “the method of inspection designated by the TSA will not be allowed to fly and also will not be permitted to simply leave the airport” (emphasis added).
The TSA will work with local police in order to make sure the person remains on the premises and answers questions. “Anyone refusing faces fines up to $11,000 and possible arrest,” reports the Palm Beach Post.
“Once a person submits to the screening process, they can not just decide to leave that process,” Sari Koshetz, regional TSA spokesperson, told the Florida newspaper. The policy includes people who decide not to fly.
Teri Barbera, a spokesperson for the Palm Beach Sheriff’s office, said local police would assist the TSA in preventing people from leaving the airport. “We will handle each incident on a case-by-case basis,” said Barbera. “The deputies will do it at the airport just as they would do it anywhere else.”
On Wednesday, TSA boss John S. Pistole testified before Congress on the controversy brewing over the fact airports have become areas where the Bill of Rights no longer applies. Pistole said the TSA will enforce the new policies despite complaints that the search methods are too invasive and a violation of the Fourth Amendment.
Senator John Ensign, a Nevada Republican, asked Pistole about groups that objected to all forms of bodily search on religious grounds. “While we respect that person’s beliefs, that person’s not going to get on an airplane,” said the TSA boss.
Now the TSA has announced it will also enlist local police to detain people who refuse dangerous naked body scans and molestation of their private parts.
In addition to not being permitted to board a commercial plane, they will also be interrogated by agents of the federal government. If not cleared by government bureaucrats, they will presumably be arrested and charged with a crime and fined $11,000.
source:
http://www.infowars.com/tsa-warns-travelers-may-be-arrested-detained-and-fine...So let me get this straight…If I decide to fly somewhere and refuse to get the radiation cancer giving naked body scanners or being felt up, I can get arrested for leaving or fined?
Basically, if you stand up for your rights under the constitution, and you refuse it and try to leave, they can arrest or fine you for doing so. They want people to submit themselves to questioning as to why they don’t want to be subjected to cancer causing radiation or bodily molestation.
What questioning could they possibly have if the answer is simply: 1. I don’t want to go thru the radiation naked scanners and have my image out there and 2. I don’t want some deviant feeling me up, perhaps with the same gloves on as they had for the previous person.
I guess now in the US, if you’re someone who doesn’t want cancer or to be molested, then in the eyes of the government, you’re the criminal.
Am I the only person who thinks that this is beyond wrong?!
http://lightoftruth.tumblr.com/post/1630982246/tsa-warns-travelers-may-be-arr...When does it become over stepping their boundaries?
--Steve
Pages: 1
