9 ms·

9th Circuit rejects TSA claim of impunity for checkpoint staff who rape traveler

250 points by rolph 3y ago

LispSporks22 3y ago
I think it's incredible the TSA would even advance such an argument.
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  (Note the headline appears misleading - this is not about staff being able to do what they want, but about whether or not TSA can be sued for damages.)
  - watwut 3y ago
    It seems like TSA actually made that argument "TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them."
- busterarm 3y ago
  Regular LEOs advance the qualified immunity argument all of the time... Qualified Immunity/Harlow v. Fitzgerald is up there among the worst SCOTUS decisions of all time and desperately needs to be reversed.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > LEOs advance the qualified immunity argument all of the time This isn't that. Qualified immunity "grants government officials...immunity" [1]. Sovereign immunity is immunity for a state itself [2]. In 1946, the U.S. waived its sovereign immunity under the Federal Tort Claims Act [3] under certain circumstances. This case was about whether those circumstances were met. The court found it was. That means sovereign immunity is waived and the TSA isn't immune. It has zero bearing on the officer's own culpability. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Tort_Claims_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Tort_Claims_Act
  - mminer237 3y ago
    Qualified immunity is irrelevant here. Rape is in no way a discretionary job task, and a reasonable person would know it's illegal. I think half of people's outrage about qualified immunity is simply not understanding what it is.
- aqme28 3y ago
  Same. Even if they had won this case, it would be a massive PR blunder.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
Note: this is a question of the TSA's liability, not the alleged rapist's. It's a question of whether sovereign immunity is waived under the Federal Tort Claims Act, and turns on whether TSA staff are "investigative or law enforcement officers of the United States" [1]. The ruling seems reasonable. But it wasn't the no-brainer the title seems to imply it was. [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...
- tssva 3y ago
  The TSA has raised these arguments in 4 separate circuits and now have lost in 4 separate circuits. Perhaps it actually is a no-brainer.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > TSA has raised these arguments in 4 separate circuits and now have lost in 4 separate circuits. Perhaps it actually is a no-brainer. The lower court ruled for the government. And despite noting this concurrence in the second paragraph of their opinion [1], the court continued for pages in its analysis. [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...
    - nescioquid 3y ago
      Cleaning dung off the wall takes a lot more effort than putting it there in the first place. I wouldn't confuse prolixity for ambiguity, in case that was your point.
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      > The lower court ruled for the government. Yeah, trial courts sometimes get no-brainers wrong, that’s significant enough that there is a reason the first level of appeal is “as of right” and not discretionary.
gnicholas 3y ago
Shouldn’t this say “immunity”, not “impunity”? One is a legal term of art, which appears over a dozen times in the linked legal opinion, and the other is a similar word that has no specific legal meaning, and which does not appear in the linked opinion at all.
- xp84 3y ago
  Yes, it seems like the linked site either doesn't realize those are two separate words, or enjoys using the latter because maybe it sounds slightly more scandalous? For a factual news story like this, I think a source less dripping with a particular POV would be great.
- TaylorAlexander 3y ago
  IANAL but this seems like a good call
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > Shouldn’t this say “immunity”, not “impunity”? Legal immunity is impunity in the common English sense, so the headline is an accurate factual description of the impact either way. > the other is a similar word that has no specific legal meaning, and which does not appear in the linked opinion at all. Neither of those is relevant to the evaluation of the headline (were the word in quotes, the fact that it is not a quote from the opinion would be relevant, but its not, so its not.)
  - gnicholas 3y ago
    > Legal immunity is impunity in the common English sense The headline says "rejects claim of impunity". There is no such thing as a "claim of impunity", even if the word "impunity" can often be substituted for "immunity"
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      > The headline says "rejects claim of impunity" And its accurate. > There is no such thing as a "claim of impunity", Yes, there is; every word in that phrase is used in the usual English sense. The fact that its not a legal term of art doesn't change that those English words accurately describe what occurred.
bastardoperator 3y ago
The TSA was literally arguing for more rape, what planet do I live on...
- macinjosh 3y ago
  On the one run by American military and security empire.
- olliej 3y ago
  No they are arguing that the TSA itself is not liable for the actions of its employees. Despite the article clearly being written to make it sound like the agents are also free from consequences this is solely about the agency itself. That said every time they have made their sovereign immunity claim it has been resoundingly rejected at the federal circuit level so it would be the decent human thing to do to just acknowledge culpability rather than constantly fighting it.
- agensaequivocum 3y ago
  The government is never your friend.
bigbacaloa 3y ago
[dead]
compiler-guy 3y ago
The question decided here isn't: "Can a TSA agent who assaults a traveler be held liable for the assault?" That answer has been "yes" for a long time. But rather: "Can the TSA itself be held liable when an agent under its control commits an assault?" The doctrine of sovereign immunity says "no". However, congress has created exceptions to sovereign immunity, and the ruling is that the TSA is included in those exceptions.
- xp84 3y ago
  Thank you for this great, succinct analysis!
- HumblyTossed 3y ago
  Succinct. Thank you.
- SoftTalker 3y ago
  That is not what TFA says: the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) argued that TSA checkpoint staff have absolute immunity from lawsuits for assault, even sexual assault or rape, committed against travelers they are “screening”. That clearly says TSA staff, not the TSA itself. Is that summary of the argument wrong?
  - blindhippo 3y ago
    Digging a bit more into the links I found this: Instead, the TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them. So TSA is claiming immunity for both staff and the agency. I didn't read the actual judgement, but I'm guessing the grandparent comment has that covered.
    - gruez 3y ago
      That might be a different case. If you look the court's opinion for this case[1], it explicitly says it's not about whether the TSA officer can be sued. >Whether Leuthauser can state a claim against TSO Serrano under Bivens is not at issue in this appeal "Leuthauser" is the plaintiff, "TSO" stands for "Transportation Security Officer" [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...
berkle4455 3y ago
Dissolve the TSA. Biggest fucking waste of tax payer money and aggregate loss of GDP ever invented.
- jghn 3y ago
  I hate the TSA. But one thing to consider is it's effectively a jobs program, just like the US military. For better or worse these are people to whom we'd likely be funneling money in one fashion or another, at least the security theater makes it more palatable to the masses :shrug:
  - Aloha 3y ago
    Also the job still needs to be done, be it TSA or something else.
  - WillPostForFood 3y ago
    For better or worse these are people to whom we'd likely be funneling money in one fashion or another Not a fan of TSA, but the people working there seem like normal, employable people. If we got rid of TSA, ~20% could probably stay working security at the Airports, and the other 80% could move on to actual productive jobs, and instead of us funneling money to them they'd be generating money.
    - jghn 3y ago
      Is that true though? Are there really that many jobs hanging around, in the areas in which these people live, paying an equal or better salary, for which these people are qualified? These aren't people who are going to stop working as a person standing around directing traffic and start coding distributed systems. EDIT: I'm assuming they're paid more than min wage, I'll admit I don't know.
      - justsomehnguy 3y ago
        I'm lazy[0], so the first links: TSA (Transportation Security Administration) salaries: How much does TSA (Transportation Security Administration) pay? Popular Roles Transportation Officer $43,454 per year Transportation Specialist $76,443 per year Marshal $67,643 per year https://www.indeed.com/cmp/TSA-(transportation-Security-Administration)/salaries Also see https://www.tsacareer.com/tsa-pay-scale/ https://www.tsacareer.com/tsa-pay-scale/ [0] well, looks I'm a bit less lazier than you, heh
wand3r 3y ago
Adjacent/Off Topic: It's really time we disband or seriously curtail the TSA. Plane travel in the US is absurd. I understand that it is s jobs scheme/work program welfare, but this makes air travel extremely difficult. At a minimum policy should be reworked around shoes & liquids and the TSA itself should be used to optimize efficiency.
- nh23423fefe 3y ago
  but have you considered terrorism? how will we fight them at the airport instead of american streets?
  - rolph 3y ago
    im not trying to roast you, but i cant find any indication that TSA procedures, policies, or persons, have stopped any terrorist incident. if you have, please share, as it looks like TSA in the present form is used for something other than transport safety, and duplicates many CBP functions.
    - justrealist 3y ago
      I'm strongly in favor of massively de-scoping the TSA, but let's be real — if you could blow up a passenger plane by mailing a bomb, with no screening whatsoever, it would have been tried a few times. It's silly to discount the deterrent effect. There are not terrorists lurking behind every door, but there are certainly disgruntled people who would do damage if there were no consequences or inhibitions.
      - rolph 3y ago
        the war probably had a major deterrent effect as well.
  - throwbadubadu 3y ago
    Is this irony?
- deleted 3y ago
Madmallard 3y ago
Shouldn’t government officials and law enforcement and such be held to higher standards than the general population not the other way around?
- xp84 3y ago
  The officials themselves aren't in question. These proceedings only concern whether TSA itself (aka the government) can be sued. That's what the 'soverign immunity' part is about. This case isn't related at all to whether the employee can be prosecuted, sued, whatever. You could make the case either way imho, pro of having immunity is that our tax dollars ideally wouldn't be spent to try to make up for some stupid thing some bad TSA agent did. Con is that ideally knowing TSA could be sued would make whoever manages the budget of TSA much more afraid to keep poorly-trained or unstable people on their staff, and/or to train and supervise them better.
  - 123pie123 3y ago
    I suspect it more about having the right processes in place to stop this from happening eg always having two people to hand, having all agents wear body cams etc.. I don't think education or training would stop a oppuntunist from raping someone
kolanos 3y ago
There have been legislative attempts to end qualified immunity, the most recent being the Ending Qualified Immunity Act [0]. Qualified immunity is not a law but an overly broad and frequently misapplied court precedent that undermines the accountability of the U.S. justice system. [0]: https://pressley.house.gov/sites/pressley.house.gov/files/Ending%20Qualified%20Immunity%20Act%20One%20Pager.pdf https://pressley.house.gov/sites/pressley.house.gov/files/En...
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
CamelCaseName 3y ago
Unbelievably disgusting behavior. "Unlike the government of Qatar, however, the US government hasn’t apologized, said that what happened was illegal (or would be illegal if the complaint is proven to be true), or referred the TSA checkpoint staff for investigation and possible prosecution. The TSA hasn’t even tried to dispute the truth and factual accuracy of the complaint. Instead, the TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them." https://papersplease.org/wp/2022/12/06/tsa-argues-for-impunity-for-checkpoint-staff-who-rape-travelers/ https://papersplease.org/wp/2022/12/06/tsa-argues-for-impuni...
- Gibbon1 3y ago
  That feels so gross it would nice if arguing that is contempt and earns the governments lawyer a month in a holding cell.
  - macintux 3y ago
    The last few years have made disbarment seem like a reasonable tool to use far more often than we do.
- theragra 3y ago
  But who has?
- aidenn0 3y ago
  > "Unlike the government of Qatar, however, the US government hasn’t apologized, said that what happened was illegal (or would be illegal if the complaint is proven to be true), or referred the TSA checkpoint staff for investigation and possible prosecution. That's the really troubling thing. We can argue about civil immunity until we are blue in the face, but non-consensual body-cavity searches at airport screening locations (which, to clarify, are against TSA policy) should be treated as criminal.
- 3y ago
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
dreamcompiler 3y ago
IANAL but it looks like the TSA partially self-owned here. As the court document [0] points out, there exists a “law enforcement proviso,” which waives sovereign immunity for torts such as assault and battery committed by “investigative or law enforcement officers of the United States Government.” In other words, government cops can be sued for assault and battery. TSA said "our people aren't cops, so they can't be sued." The court said "Aha! You gave them badges! So they're cops!" (I'm oversimplifying -- the badges were just one piece of evidence the court cited). Back in 2008, the TSA made a big deal about giving their people badges so they would be more respected by the public [1]. The court document even points this out and provides the [now dead] link to the press release. There was a bit of PR blowback then because most members of the public didn't think TSA screeners deserved badges. But the TSA insisted that they did, so now they have badges. So that means they can be sued. Oops. [0] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2... [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20170429182331/https://www.tsa.gov/news/releases/2008/09/11/transportation-security-officers-have-renewed-focus-and-new-look-seventh https://web.archive.org/web/20170429182331/https://www.tsa.g...
N_A_T_E 3y ago
Do we really still need such a giant TSA? What would it take to reduce the scanning burden per passenger? The existing process is basically "security theater" anyway.

250 points by rolph 3y ago

LispSporks22 3y ago

I think it's incredible the TSA would even advance such an argument.

robertlagrant 3y ago
(Note the headline appears misleading - this is not about staff being able to do what they want, but about whether or not TSA can be sued for damages.)
- watwut 3y ago
  It seems like TSA actually made that argument "TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them."
busterarm 3y ago
Regular LEOs advance the qualified immunity argument all of the time... Qualified Immunity/Harlow v. Fitzgerald is up there among the worst SCOTUS decisions of all time and desperately needs to be reversed.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > LEOs advance the qualified immunity argument all of the time This isn't that. Qualified immunity "grants government officials...immunity" [1]. Sovereign immunity is immunity for a state itself [2]. In 1946, the U.S. waived its sovereign immunity under the Federal Tort Claims Act [3] under certain circumstances. This case was about whether those circumstances were met. The court found it was. That means sovereign immunity is waived and the TSA isn't immune. It has zero bearing on the officer's own culpability. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Tort_Claims_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Tort_Claims_Act
- mminer237 3y ago
  Qualified immunity is irrelevant here. Rape is in no way a discretionary job task, and a reasonable person would know it's illegal. I think half of people's outrage about qualified immunity is simply not understanding what it is.
aqme28 3y ago
Same. Even if they had won this case, it would be a massive PR blunder.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

Note: this is a question of the TSA's liability, not the alleged rapist's. It's a question of whether sovereign immunity is waived under the Federal Tort Claims Act, and turns on whether TSA staff are "investigative or law enforcement officers of the United States" [1]. The ruling seems reasonable. But it wasn't the no-brainer the title seems to imply it was. [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...

tssva 3y ago
The TSA has raised these arguments in 4 separate circuits and now have lost in 4 separate circuits. Perhaps it actually is a no-brainer.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > TSA has raised these arguments in 4 separate circuits and now have lost in 4 separate circuits. Perhaps it actually is a no-brainer. The lower court ruled for the government. And despite noting this concurrence in the second paragraph of their opinion [1], the court continued for pages in its analysis. [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...
  - nescioquid 3y ago
    Cleaning dung off the wall takes a lot more effort than putting it there in the first place. I wouldn't confuse prolixity for ambiguity, in case that was your point.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    > The lower court ruled for the government. Yeah, trial courts sometimes get no-brainers wrong, that’s significant enough that there is a reason the first level of appeal is “as of right” and not discretionary.

gnicholas 3y ago

Shouldn’t this say “immunity”, not “impunity”? One is a legal term of art, which appears over a dozen times in the linked legal opinion, and the other is a similar word that has no specific legal meaning, and which does not appear in the linked opinion at all.

xp84 3y ago
Yes, it seems like the linked site either doesn't realize those are two separate words, or enjoys using the latter because maybe it sounds slightly more scandalous? For a factual news story like this, I think a source less dripping with a particular POV would be great.
TaylorAlexander 3y ago
IANAL but this seems like a good call
dragonwriter 3y ago
> Shouldn’t this say “immunity”, not “impunity”? Legal immunity is impunity in the common English sense, so the headline is an accurate factual description of the impact either way. > the other is a similar word that has no specific legal meaning, and which does not appear in the linked opinion at all. Neither of those is relevant to the evaluation of the headline (were the word in quotes, the fact that it is not a quote from the opinion would be relevant, but its not, so its not.)
- gnicholas 3y ago
  > Legal immunity is impunity in the common English sense The headline says "rejects claim of impunity". There is no such thing as a "claim of impunity", even if the word "impunity" can often be substituted for "immunity"
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    > The headline says "rejects claim of impunity" And its accurate. > There is no such thing as a "claim of impunity", Yes, there is; every word in that phrase is used in the usual English sense. The fact that its not a legal term of art doesn't change that those English words accurately describe what occurred.

bastardoperator 3y ago

The TSA was literally arguing for more rape, what planet do I live on...

macinjosh 3y ago
On the one run by American military and security empire.
olliej 3y ago
No they are arguing that the TSA itself is not liable for the actions of its employees. Despite the article clearly being written to make it sound like the agents are also free from consequences this is solely about the agency itself. That said every time they have made their sovereign immunity claim it has been resoundingly rejected at the federal circuit level so it would be the decent human thing to do to just acknowledge culpability rather than constantly fighting it.
agensaequivocum 3y ago
The government is never your friend.

bigbacaloa 3y ago

[dead]

compiler-guy 3y ago

The question decided here isn't: "Can a TSA agent who assaults a traveler be held liable for the assault?" That answer has been "yes" for a long time. But rather: "Can the TSA itself be held liable when an agent under its control commits an assault?" The doctrine of sovereign immunity says "no". However, congress has created exceptions to sovereign immunity, and the ruling is that the TSA is included in those exceptions.

xp84 3y ago
Thank you for this great, succinct analysis!
HumblyTossed 3y ago
Succinct. Thank you.
SoftTalker 3y ago
That is not what TFA says: the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) argued that TSA checkpoint staff have absolute immunity from lawsuits for assault, even sexual assault or rape, committed against travelers they are “screening”. That clearly says TSA staff, not the TSA itself. Is that summary of the argument wrong?
- blindhippo 3y ago
  Digging a bit more into the links I found this: Instead, the TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them. So TSA is claiming immunity for both staff and the agency. I didn't read the actual judgement, but I'm guessing the grandparent comment has that covered.
  - gruez 3y ago
    That might be a different case. If you look the court's opinion for this case[1], it explicitly says it's not about whether the TSA officer can be sued. >Whether Leuthauser can state a claim against TSO Serrano under Bivens is not at issue in this appeal "Leuthauser" is the plaintiff, "TSO" stands for "Transportation Security Officer" [1] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2...

berkle4455 3y ago

Dissolve the TSA. Biggest fucking waste of tax payer money and aggregate loss of GDP ever invented.

jghn 3y ago
I hate the TSA. But one thing to consider is it's effectively a jobs program, just like the US military. For better or worse these are people to whom we'd likely be funneling money in one fashion or another, at least the security theater makes it more palatable to the masses :shrug:
- Aloha 3y ago
  Also the job still needs to be done, be it TSA or something else.
- WillPostForFood 3y ago
  For better or worse these are people to whom we'd likely be funneling money in one fashion or another Not a fan of TSA, but the people working there seem like normal, employable people. If we got rid of TSA, ~20% could probably stay working security at the Airports, and the other 80% could move on to actual productive jobs, and instead of us funneling money to them they'd be generating money.
  - jghn 3y ago
    Is that true though? Are there really that many jobs hanging around, in the areas in which these people live, paying an equal or better salary, for which these people are qualified? These aren't people who are going to stop working as a person standing around directing traffic and start coding distributed systems. EDIT: I'm assuming they're paid more than min wage, I'll admit I don't know.
    - justsomehnguy 3y ago
      I'm lazy[0], so the first links: TSA (Transportation Security Administration) salaries: How much does TSA (Transportation Security Administration) pay? Popular Roles Transportation Officer $43,454 per year Transportation Specialist $76,443 per year Marshal $67,643 per year https://www.indeed.com/cmp/TSA-(transportation-Security-Administration)/salaries Also see https://www.tsacareer.com/tsa-pay-scale/ https://www.tsacareer.com/tsa-pay-scale/ [0] well, looks I'm a bit less lazier than you, heh

wand3r 3y ago

Adjacent/Off Topic: It's really time we disband or seriously curtail the TSA. Plane travel in the US is absurd. I understand that it is s jobs scheme/work program welfare, but this makes air travel extremely difficult. At a minimum policy should be reworked around shoes & liquids and the TSA itself should be used to optimize efficiency.

nh23423fefe 3y ago
but have you considered terrorism? how will we fight them at the airport instead of american streets?
- rolph 3y ago
  im not trying to roast you, but i cant find any indication that TSA procedures, policies, or persons, have stopped any terrorist incident. if you have, please share, as it looks like TSA in the present form is used for something other than transport safety, and duplicates many CBP functions.
  - justrealist 3y ago
    I'm strongly in favor of massively de-scoping the TSA, but let's be real — if you could blow up a passenger plane by mailing a bomb, with no screening whatsoever, it would have been tried a few times. It's silly to discount the deterrent effect. There are not terrorists lurking behind every door, but there are certainly disgruntled people who would do damage if there were no consequences or inhibitions.
    - rolph 3y ago
      the war probably had a major deterrent effect as well.
- throwbadubadu 3y ago
  Is this irony?
deleted 3y ago

Madmallard 3y ago

Shouldn’t government officials and law enforcement and such be held to higher standards than the general population not the other way around?

xp84 3y ago
The officials themselves aren't in question. These proceedings only concern whether TSA itself (aka the government) can be sued. That's what the 'soverign immunity' part is about. This case isn't related at all to whether the employee can be prosecuted, sued, whatever. You could make the case either way imho, pro of having immunity is that our tax dollars ideally wouldn't be spent to try to make up for some stupid thing some bad TSA agent did. Con is that ideally knowing TSA could be sued would make whoever manages the budget of TSA much more afraid to keep poorly-trained or unstable people on their staff, and/or to train and supervise them better.
- 123pie123 3y ago
  I suspect it more about having the right processes in place to stop this from happening eg always having two people to hand, having all agents wear body cams etc.. I don't think education or training would stop a oppuntunist from raping someone

kolanos 3y ago

There have been legislative attempts to end qualified immunity, the most recent being the Ending Qualified Immunity Act [0]. Qualified immunity is not a law but an overly broad and frequently misapplied court precedent that undermines the accountability of the U.S. justice system. [0]: https://pressley.house.gov/sites/pressley.house.gov/files/Ending%20Qualified%20Immunity%20Act%20One%20Pager.pdf https://pressley.house.gov/sites/pressley.house.gov/files/En...

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

CamelCaseName 3y ago

Unbelievably disgusting behavior. "Unlike the government of Qatar, however, the US government hasn’t apologized, said that what happened was illegal (or would be illegal if the complaint is proven to be true), or referred the TSA checkpoint staff for investigation and possible prosecution. The TSA hasn’t even tried to dispute the truth and factual accuracy of the complaint. Instead, the TSA has argued that, even if all of the allegations in Ms. Leuthauser’s complaint are true, the TSA and its employees have absolute impunity. Regardless of what “torts”, even rape, TSA checkpoint staff commit against travelers, the government claims that Federal courts have no jurisdiction to hear lawsuits or consider claims against them." https://papersplease.org/wp/2022/12/06/tsa-argues-for-impunity-for-checkpoint-staff-who-rape-travelers/ https://papersplease.org/wp/2022/12/06/tsa-argues-for-impuni...

Gibbon1 3y ago
That feels so gross it would nice if arguing that is contempt and earns the governments lawyer a month in a holding cell.
- macintux 3y ago
  The last few years have made disbarment seem like a reasonable tool to use far more often than we do.
theragra 3y ago
But who has?
aidenn0 3y ago
> "Unlike the government of Qatar, however, the US government hasn’t apologized, said that what happened was illegal (or would be illegal if the complaint is proven to be true), or referred the TSA checkpoint staff for investigation and possible prosecution. That's the really troubling thing. We can argue about civil immunity until we are blue in the face, but non-consensual body-cavity searches at airport screening locations (which, to clarify, are against TSA policy) should be treated as criminal.
3y ago

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

dreamcompiler 3y ago

IANAL but it looks like the TSA partially self-owned here. As the court document [0] points out, there exists a “law enforcement proviso,” which waives sovereign immunity for torts such as assault and battery committed by “investigative or law enforcement officers of the United States Government.” In other words, government cops can be sued for assault and battery. TSA said "our people aren't cops, so they can't be sued." The court said "Aha! You gave them badges! So they're cops!" (I'm oversimplifying -- the badges were just one piece of evidence the court cited). Back in 2008, the TSA made a big deal about giving their people badges so they would be more respected by the public [1]. The court document even points this out and provides the [now dead] link to the press release. There was a bit of PR blowback then because most members of the public didn't think TSA screeners deserved badges. But the TSA insisted that they did, so now they have badges. So that means they can be sued. Oops. [0] https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/22-15402.pdf https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/26/2... [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20170429182331/https://www.tsa.gov/news/releases/2008/09/11/transportation-security-officers-have-renewed-focus-and-new-look-seventh https://web.archive.org/web/20170429182331/https://www.tsa.g...

N_A_T_E 3y ago

Do we really still need such a giant TSA? What would it take to reduce the scanning burden per passenger? The existing process is basically "security theater" anyway.