An airline passenger in Florida was on her way to Cleveland for her brother’s funeral when she says she was inappropriately groped by a female TSA worker doing a security patdown.
To demonstrate the invasive touching, she groped a female TSA supervisor, for which she was removed from her flight, arrested and charged with misdemeanor battery.
Carol Price, the passenger, is a former TSA agent herself and says she knows the proper way to conduct a patdown, and what she got from a former co-worker at Southwest Florida International Airport wasn’t proper. According to her attorney, the agent conducted an “extremely inappropriate search” by groping Price’s genitals and breasts.
The video above doesn’t show the initial groping, but does show Price putting down her jacket and carry-on items and grabbing a supervisor roughly between her legs to demonstrate the patdown Price had received.
“She did not touch the supervisor as intrusively as she was touched,” Price’s attorney, John Mills, told a local NBC station.
He suggested that the inappropriate behavior his client received may have been personal, since she knew the worker who patted her down, a former colleague.
“She’s obviously been through training and knew this lady,” he said.
While complaining about the patdown to another TSA worker, the video shows that worker giving Price a hug.
Nonetheless, as a result of the incident, Price missed the flight to her brother’s funeral and is now fighting to clear herself of the charges.
TSA released a statement saying that “violence against our officers who work every day to keep the traveling public safe is unacceptable.”