Transportation Security Administration changes procedure after Lambert incident

Transportation Security Administration screeners at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport probably wish that the fellow they chose to grill last March about a box of cash wasn't a Ron Paul devotee who runs a committee devoted to individual rights and constitutional government. But grill Steven Bierfeldt they did, and eight months later the incident has yielded revised rules requiring TSA agents to stick to matters related to flight security rather than policing airports for other crimes. Bierfeldt and the American Civil Liberties Union, which represented him in a lawsuit, announced in a news release this week that the TSA had changed its rules in response to the litigation. It's a huge victory for civil liberties that TSA agents no longer have free rein to conduct sweeping, baseless searches and detain passengers who don't pose a threat to flight safety," Bierfeldt said in a statement. Bierfeldt said he was ushered to a small room and questioned after passing a metal box containing $4,700 through a Lambert screening checkpoint. He said the cash related to his job as director of development for the Campaign for Liberty, a lobbying group that sprouted from the presidential campaign last year of U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, the libertarian Republican from Texas. Bierfeldt said he was interrogated for a half-hour in an increasingly threatening manner and told he was being placed under arrest. He recorded audio of the episode on his iPhone. Before it was due to be heard in September, the ACLU said the TSA issued a policy directive stating that "screening may not be conducted to detect evidence of crimes unrelated to transportation security."...read more