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A weight may soon be lifted off a Maryland woman charged with carrying a concealed weapon in an airport.

It wasn't a gun or a knife. It was a weighted bookmark.

Kathryn Harrington was flying home from vacation last month when screeners at the Tampa, Fla., airport found her bookmark. It's an 8.5-inch leather strip with small lead weights at each end.

Airport police said it resembled a weighted weapon that could be used to knock people unconscious. So the 52-year-old special education teacher was handcuffed, put into a police car, and charged with carrying a concealed weapon.

She faced a possible criminal trial and a $10,000 fine. But the state declined to prosecute, and the Transportation Security Administration said it probably won't impose a fine.

Harrington said she'll never again carry her bookmark into an airport.

And she was taught her lesson to mindlessly follow what ever edict is pronouced by her new overlords.

Well...another excellent job performed by the brave and ever-vigilant TSA! Can you imagine what would happen if we just turned a blind eye to 52 year old Special Ed. teachers carrying weighted leather saps disguised as bookmarks?  With all these ASSault rifles flooding the streets now, God only knows what they might show up with next disguised as a hair dryer or some such! I, for one, salute the TSA and it's selfless and dedicated employees who are daily sucking up my tax dollars to make this a safer world!

(The single-finger South Georgia salute that is!...also known in some circles as the friendly New York Howdy!)

RRRRRRRRR, if it were up to me I'd haul that terrorist bitch out to the alley and cut her fucking head off with me pirate sword. RRRRR.

That's what happens when you take your assault blackjack into the "no weapon" zone.

Quoted: And she was taught her lesson to mindlessly follow what ever edict is pronouced by her new overlords.

Sadly, so many accept what is shoved down their throats without complaint.

I actually made it on to a flight with.......scissors! (GASP!)

I had bought a one way ticket for me and the wife. Well, we get to the security screener and they say you have a "checkerboard" on your boarding pass, which means you have to undergo additional screening. I've flown enough so I knew we were going to be picked for the additional screening because the ticket was one way, we bought it two weeks prior, and we didn't check any luggage. Let me say right now, the whole time I was showing them my military ID. I've heard the military ID gets you out of the "special" screening, but it hadn't worked that way for me EVER. I must have made a half dozen one-way trips after 9/11, I've always shown my military ID because it's the ID that is handiest in my wallet. I've even flown one way on orders and still had the special screening.

So I get to the special screening area and present my ID to the screener. He stops, says I don't have to have undergo the additional screening, but I have to be wanded because I set of the metal detector. I've got to stop wearing a belt on planes. Anyway the guy from the x-ray machine tells the screener that I have scissors in my bag.  The scissors are my wife's. She was doing cross-stitch on the trip and brought her scissors, but she put the scissors in my bag. The screener seemed to ignore the information about the scissors and sent me on my way.

While being relieved that I didn't have to undergo an anal probe because my wife didn't think about the scissors and throw them away or leave them behind like we usually do when we are flying, I was disturbed that there seems to be a special class.

Quoted: Airport police said it resembled a weighted weapon that could be used to knock people unconscious.

Oh for crying out loud!  It was a weighted bookmark.  The only thing it was probably heavy enough to knock out was a mouse.  

Unless of course she nailed the bookmark to a 2 X 4.

This reminds me of the story where the GI Joe M16 was confiscated from a kid.

Is this one like the other teacher who was arrested for taking a sharp pointed compass, a protractor and a slide rule onto an airplane?
She was charged with possession of Weapons of Math Destruction!

Give me a break

One of the requirements for being a Air Port POLICE  must be --- being a retard ?

Quoted: This reminds me of the story where the GI Joe M16 was confiscated from a kid.

Are you serious????

Quoted: Quoted: This reminds me of the story where the GI Joe M16 was confiscated from a kid. Are you serious????

Yep.  I think it was posted here w/i the last year (rough guess).

Edited to add:
I spoke too soon; I had the facts wrong.  A lady was carrying GI Joe back to London for her grandson.

www.post-gazette.com/forum/col/20020818edjack18p2.asp

Judy Powell, 55, a British tourist, bought a G.I. Joe doll for her grandson, George, while on a visit to Los Angeles. When she tried to board a flight home to London, security screeners at LAX confiscated the 2-inch plastic M-16 the doll was "armed" with. The Transportation Security Administration has a list of 66 items -- including toy guns and transformer robots -- that are now banned from airplanes. If you are caught with one in your luggage, you could be fined up to $1,100.

www.dojgov.net/USDOJ_Main.htm

GI Joe Toy, Strip Searched at LA International Airport DOJgov.net Newswire Oct 13, 2002 Travelers who frequent US airports might feel a bit safer knowing that the US Government's new and efficient war on terror found and confiscated an M16 rifle being brought on an airplane at LA International Airport. It was a two inch long plastic GI Joe gun being held by none other than a toy replica of GI Joe himself. Judy Powell, 55, from Walton on the Hill, Surrey, England, bought the GI Joe toy in Las Vegas and packed it in her carry-on luggage. But the newly upgraded and federalized security staff earned their guaranteed job security, 40% raise in pay and lavish federal pensions by refusing to let Powell on board the plane with the tiny replica rifle. "Security examined the toy as if it was going to shoot them and looked at the rifle," Powell reported. An airport spokesman explained the incident by saying "We have instructions to confiscate anything that looks like a weapons or a replica. If GI Joe was carrying a replica, then it had to be taken from him." The two inch plastic toy will be used to boost screeners' percentages of confiscated "dangerous weapons." After much to do, the disarmed GI Joe figure was then allowed to continue on his travels with its owner.

they're the .gov and they're here to help YOU!





I worked with the tsa on a daily basis,  not the brightest crayons in the box, if yaknowwhatImean.

Quoted: One of the requirements for being a Air Port POLICE  must be --- being a retard ?

I know a few of them who work at Tulsa International Airport.

They ALL have one thing in common, they're ALL police academy rejects and wanna-be's

Let's see, and the last time a G.I. Joe took over a plane was when? If that lady had only shown the TSA his dog tags everything would have been OK.

Quoted: Edited to add: I spoke too soon; I had the facts wrong.  A lady was carrying GI Joe back to London for her grandson. [

Even still....

Quoted: Let's see, and the last time a G.I. Joe took over a plane was when? If that lady had only shown the TSA his dog tags everything would have been OK.

LOL!

My wife forgot her mace in her purse. They took the mace, filled out some paper work and sent us on our way.  She did get a letter later telling her she’s on a list and could have been fines $1,500 but they declined that. Arrested for 8 1/2 inch bookmark? I've worn cowboy boots that would have made a better weapon than that
Gerry

Where can I buy a Sap that doubles as a bookmark?

This one is only 11" long, so I guess it could double as a bookmark.

The Bookmark SAP!

I've seen the screeners in Tampa airport.I swear they beat the cops for donut consumption.

God help us.

Meanwhile the Arab in the other line got a free pass and was not checked to avoid profiling

Quoted: Meanwhile the Arab in the other line got a free pass and was not checked to avoid profiling

Ain't political correctness a bitch?