(TSA) Airport passenger screener charged in distributing child pornography

[Earth_First]

A passenger screener at Philadelphia International Airport is facing charges that he distributed more than 100 images of child pornography via Facebook, records show.

Federal agents also allege that Transportation Safety Administration Officer Thomas Gordon Jr. of Philadelphia, who routinely searched airline passengers, uploaded explicit pictures of young girls to an Internet site on which he also posted a photograph of himself in his TSA uniform.

Homeland Security agents arrested the TSA officer March 24, and he is being held without bail.

Although the case was unsealed Thursday, neither the indictment nor the news release mentioned Gordon's job searching airline passengers for TSA.

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20110423_Airport_passenger_screener_charged_in_distributing_child_pornography.html

[CBGLuthier]

1. wonder how many children OUR TSA let him fondle?

[crickets]

6. +1

I don't know what I'm going to do the next time I need to travel the distance which usually requires an air flight. I refuse to get into the backscatter X-ray scanner, and I refuse to submit to a body search which is, essentially, a sexual assault. If I had children I would never, ever consent to having them endure the pat down.

:shrug:

Am I and others who feel like me really the threat in this situation?

[notesdev]

8. not just let, PAID HIM to fondle!!!

[franzia99]

11. It's every pervert's dream to get paid for doing what s/he loves.

[baldingrockwarlord2]

2. Who is screening the screeners, anyway?

n/t

[franzia99]

12. You think the gov may have contracted the job out to NAMBLA?

[DCKit]

3. On freakin' FACEBOOK?

Teh stupidity is hugh.

If only Wall St. and the banksters were so blatant in their exploits, the DOJ might have something REAL to look at.

[LisaL]

4. Considering he posted a photo of himself wearing

his TSA uniform, he must have been real proud of his job.

[Arctic Dave]

5. What a moron.

One question, why did the homeland security thugs arrest him and not FBI or local police?

Was this a PR sentence for the jackboots?

[readmoreoften]

7. It was inevitable. That's why the idea of corporate-owned govt agents patting kids

would have probably been unacceptable to the US founders. (Well, maybe not Alexander Hamilton, but certainly the majority of them...)

[seabeyond]

9. hey people promoting and demanding this. fuck you.... nt

[franzia99]

10. Uggh. I wonder how many children this guy has full body fondled in his role as a TSA agent.

Pretty sickening.

[MadHound]

13. Isn't this like the second or third one?

I could swear I've read this headline before, perhaps like a year ago.

Or perhaps it was a sexual predator that worked for the TSA. Or perhaps both.

Our tax dollars at work, do you feel any safer now?

[franzia99]

14. I think some number of pervs will be attracted to this job b/c they get to touch ppls' genitals

For this reason, I bet as long as this is going on there will be some TSA workers who use this job to sexually victimize people.

[Initech]

16. I can virtually guarantee this is one of those things that will not end well.

If it even ends, I bet this story will put an end to it.

[ohheckyeah]

15. So, not only did TSA

hire a pervert but an idiot. Great, our 'safety' is in the hands of idiots.

[franzia99]

17. Plenty of them are incompetent. A survey a while back showed that a lot of weapons got past them.

Yet they'll let no five year old go unfondled.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/loaded-gun-slips-past-tsa-screeners/story?id=12412458

Last fall, as he had done hundreds of times, Iranian-American businessman Farid Seif passed through security at a Houston airport and boarded an international flight.

He didn't realize he had forgotten to remove the loaded snub nose "baby" Glock pistol from his computer bag. But TSA officers never noticed as his bag glided along the belt and was x-rayed. When he got to his hotel after the three-hour flight, he was shocked to discover the gun traveled unnoticed from Houston.

Experts tell ABC News that every year since the September 11 terror attacks, federal agencies have conducted random, covert "red team tests," where undercover agents try to see just how much they can get past security checks at major U.S. airports. And while the Department of Homeland Security closely guards the results as classified, those that have leaked in media reports have been shocking.

According to one report, undercover TSA agents testing security at a Newark airport terminal on one day in 2006 found that TSA screeners failed to detect concealed bombs and guns 20 out of 22 times. A 2007 government audit leaked to USA Today revealed that undercover agents were successful slipping simulated explosives and bomb parts through Los Angeles's LAX airport in 50 out of 70 attempts, and at Chicago's O'Hare airport agents made 75 attempts and succeeded in getting through undetected 45 times.

[Initech]

18. I just heard something completely crazy.

My aunt works at a hospital in Phoenix, and one of her co-workers got caught with child porn on Facebook. Same thing! I wonder if there's a huge ring operating under our very noses?