Green Party activist denied Chicago flight bangornews.com
BANGOR — Green Party activist Nancy Oden was grounded at Bangor International Airport on Thursday after reportedly becoming uncooperative when she was targeted for additional screening.
Oden, who said she believed she was singled out for extra scrutiny because of her activist past and public opposition to the current war effort, was on her way to Chicago to attend a Green Party USA meeting when airline personnel told her that she had been selected to undergo added security screening before boarding.
“I was treated if I were guilty just because I’m a dissident and I speak out,” Oden, a middle-aged woman who sits on the party’s national coordinating committee, said from her Jonesboro home after she had abandoned her travel plans. “They’re looking at me like I’m a terrorist and I’m just a peaceful person trying to go to a meeting in Chicago.”
Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, security has been tightened at all the nation’s airports — including BIA, where armed National Guardsmen monitor the screening area and passenger lists are checked against the FBI’s terrorist watch list.
Officials at BIA and American Eagle Airlines have a much different account of Oden’s afternoon run-in with the added security.
“She was uncooperative during the screening process,” said American Eagle spokesman Kurt Iverson, who added that Oden reportedly would not stand still when security staff tried to wave a metal-detecting wand over her. “Obviously if they can’t submit to screening, [Federal Aviation Administration] regulations require that they not be allowed to board the plane.”
Oden said that while she asked security staff not to touch her with the wand, she did allow them to complete their search of both her person and her baggage. Oden said that she did pull away from a National Guardsman when he grabbed her left arm and asked her if she “knew what happened on September 11,” she said.
While acknowledging that Oden was singled out for added extensive screening, authorities said it was more likely due to the manner in which she purchased her ticket than for her activist past.
Under newly adopted FAA regulations, more passengers — either randomly or based on a computerized profile — are being targeted for more intense screening during the boarding process.
While industry officials were unwilling to release the criteria under which they would profile a passenger, they said the criteria did not include federally protected characteristics such as race, religion, age or sex.
Without providing details, interim airport director Rebecca Hupp said that the FAA guidelines “have more to do with the ticket than the person.” For instance, one airline official said, a passenger who pays cash for a ticket the day of the flight would likely undergo added scrutiny.
Oden bought her nonrefundable ticket online, she said.
While an FBI spokeswoman would neither confirm nor deny the presence of any name on the terrorist watch list — another trigger for added security response — one law enforcement source said it was “extremely unlikely” Oden was on the list of potential terrorists because her name is unknown to the FBI.
After the incident, Oden was told she could not take her scheduled flight to Chicago, and that she could not travel on any other airline at the airport that day.
“If I had done something wrong, they should have arrested me instead of denying me my right to travel,” an upset Oden said Friday. “We’re losing more of our rights and people don’t realize it.” |
