Atlanta Cops Detain Man for Recording TSA Checkpoint

By Carlos Miller
PINAC
Sep. 09, 2013

By now, everybody except TSA screeners and airport cops pretty much know we are legally allowed to video record TSA checkpoints at airports.

The policy has been clearly stated on the Transportation Security Administration website since at least 2008, which is when I first came across it, and has been modified over the years to make it shorter, clearer but, of course, to add a disclaimer that “taking photographs may also prompt airport police or a TSA official to ask what your purpose is.”

In the latest video, which was posted August 30, a man with two video cameras, including a Go Pro strapped to his head, decides to test out the policy by standing well away from a checkpoint and recording at Hartsfield--Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

At 1:30 in the video, an Atlanta cop named S. Garono marches up to him in a frantic manner and tells him he is not permitted to do so.

That begins the tired-old routine of the cops firing off questions with the citizen refusing to answer them, prompting the cop to find his refusal suspicious.

In this case, the cop immediately got on his radio to call for the FBI.

The man recording, who goes by the Youtube username OccupyFromTheNorth, began shaking, which is something cops are trained to find even more suspicious, oblivious to the fact that nervousness is a natural reaction to being confronted by gun-wielding government agents legally allowed to kill you on the spot.

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