[ISL]

If you cannot leave, are you not detained?

"This is absolutely correct, at this time he was in limbo, he was not being detained, but he could not leave. A person cannot simply leave the security area of any airport once they are on the airside but have not satisfactorily completed screening. Once a person has passed through security, but is not cleared to fly and then chooses to leave, such as Mr. Mukerjee, s/he must be escorted out of the secure area (and usually the terminal)."

[MattyRad]

The police force is holding you against your will for the purpose of determining if you are guilty of a crime. But no, you're not being detained.

If there is one line that discredits this entire article, that is it. I mean, why not just call it what it is? He was being detained, and given that there was some evidence (explosive readings) against him, then there was some probable cause to do so. I'm not saying the TSA is justified in that regard... only that the article is completely disingenuous by implying that he wasn't held against his will at the hands of law enforcement.

[kyllo]

This is complete bullshit. "Limbo" is not a thing. Either you are being detained, or you are free to leave.

[ars]

No, there's a third option: You will be free to leave after some defined event occurs.

[simonster]

Does this "defined event" actually have any legal status? How long can it take until the defined event occurs? It's possible that this is an intentionally murky area of the law (i.e., a judge can decide that preventing a person from leaving for an hour in case X is okay but 1 minute in case Y is not). Even so, it seems like if there's a person in front of you with legal authority to let you out of a secured area and you are asking them to let you out, then either they have to let you out or you are being detained.

[arjie]

That sounds precisely like 'detention'. For instance, people are detained pending trial. In fact, imprisonment is also being free to leave after some defined event occurs - namely the completion of sentence. This third option is exactly the first option.

[einhverfr]

No. In that case you are detained until that event occurs, like the person showing up to escort you out, or someone posting bail, or the police handing you your ticket and saying you are free to leave.

[vidarh]

In that case you are detained. Temporarily, but you are still detained.

[unreal37]

If you're in an airport security section, you're not free to go wherever you like. He wanted to go to the back of the line. They said he could leave the airport. But his bag still needed to be searched. He was free to leave, but he didn't want to leave. He wanted to go catch his flight.

[prawn]

He didn't want to let his laptop out of his sight. I'd behave the same way given how important my work/data is to me.

[etchalon]

Which is completely reasonable.

But the fact their guidelines require his bag to be cleared before he could have it back does not mean he was "detained".

There are some pretty goddamn good reasons why the bag of a dude who tests positive for explosives has to be cleared before he's given it and allowed to run around an airport full of people.

[gnoway]

I guess what I don't understand is why someone didn't just clear the bag then. After reading the original blog post and then this rebuttal, it's not clear why the guy was delayed for a full day. His situation was important enough to warrant repeated interviews by about 12 different people from 3-4 different groups, but not important enough to have someone else clear the bag? Are we supposed to believe that a major NY international airport doesn't have multiple instances of the necessary tools on standby to process this kind of thing quickly and efficiently?

This rebuttal also ignores the allegations of numerous instances of snide, provocative remarks by the various security and administrative officials. I'm sure Mr. Mukerjee was not helping himself with his own behavior, but does that give the TSA and related authorities license to be unprofessional in return? Does it help the situation to take a suspicious person who hasn't actually done anything and agitate them?

I'm sorry, but this rebuttal doesn't restore any confidence in the TSA, DHS, Port Authorities, airports or any other related group. I am so glad I have no cause to travel by air.

[etchalon]

It doesn't sound like he actually tried to pursue that. He was told, "You can leave, but the bag stays." He chose to stay. They decided to keep questioning him.

[vidarh]

> There are some pretty goddamn good reasons why the bag of a dude who tests positive for explosives has to be cleared before he's given it and allowed to run around an airport full of people.

If so, there are some pretty good reason why, if they consider that threat even remotely real, they should clear the area.

A good indication that the actual terrorist threat is absolutely vanishingly small: If there were lots of terrorists around, one of the easiest targets these days that'd maximize the amount of terror, is airport security screening areas. If they get through, they could defuse the bomb and blow it up on a plane instead, if not, they could let it go off on a timer and take out both a lot of passengers and a lot of security people.

[etchalon]

I don't know how much faith I'd put into your hypothetical.

I'm not implying the terrorist threat is large – it's really, super small. But just because they haven't done THAT yet, doesn't mean they won't. So far, in the US, what they've done is sneak explosives onto planes.

[prawn]

Wasn't he running around with his bag in that airport full of people before he got to the security check?

[etchalon]

"Free to leave" and "free to roam about the airport" are two vastly different things.

He was free to leave the airport, if escorted, as the article states quite clearly.