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More than 300 passengers tried to evade airport security in the last year, TSA says
Washington — Hundreds of passengers circumvented or tried to circumvent various aspects of airport security to access secure areas of U.S. airports within the last year, according to the Transportation Security Administration.
Since March 2023, there have been at least 300 instances of people trying to bypass parts of airport security, the agency said Friday. Only a small number actually made it onto a plane, although the TSA declined to disclose the exact number. The security lapse figures were first reported by The Washington Post.
Of those roughly 300 incidents, about 200 were people trying to enter the secure area of the airport at the point where passengers exit. Another 80 bypassed the TSA podium where agents check IDs, but were screened and got their luggage through security. Of those 80, 85% were stopped and arrested by law enforcement for trespassing, according to the TSA.
A TSA spokesperson said most of the incidents were the result of “inadvertent and unintentional actions by the passenger.”
“In those rare instances where a passenger attempts to breach a portion of the security process, TSA immediately investigates and takes corrective action,” the spokesperson said.
Last month, a 26-year-old man was arrested after he made it onto a Delta plane at the Salt Lake City Airport. He made it through security with a valid boarding pass on standby for a flight that was full. Security footage showed him taking photos of other passengers’ boarding passes, one of which he apparently used to board another flight. He was removed from the plane before takeoff.
In February, a woman boarded an American Airlines flight from Nashville to Los Angeles without a boarding pass. At the time, the TSA confirmed the woman snuck past the ID checkpoint, although she did go through security. The woman was taken into custody.
The TSA only considers it a “security breach” when someone completely evades security screening.
The agency said airports across the country are working on new technology and updates at their exits to ensure people can only go one way, steps that have already been implemented in new terminals at Washington’s Reagan National Airport and New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Kris Van Cleave contributed to this report.
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Wisconsin school shooter was in contact with California man plotting his own attack, court documents say
The shooter who killed a student and teacher at a religious school in Wisconsin brought two guns to the school and was in contact with a man in California whom authorities say was planning to attack a government building, according to authorities and court documents that became public Wednesday.
Police were still investigating why the 15-year-old student at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison shot and killed a fellow student and teacher on Monday before shooting herself, Madison Police Chief Shon Barnes told the Associated Press Wednesday. Two other students who were shot remained in critical condition on Wednesday.
A Southern California judge issued a restraining order Tuesday under California’s gun red flag law against a 20-year-old Carlsbad man. The order requires the man to turn his guns and ammunition into police within 48 hours unless an officer asks for them sooner because he poses an immediate danger to himself and others.
Carlsbad is located just north of San Diego.
According to the order, the man told FBI agents that he had been messaging Natalie Rupnow, the Wisconsin shooter, about attacking a government building with a gun and explosives. The order doesn’t say what building he had targeted or when he planned to launch his attack. It also doesn’t detail his interactions with Rupnow except to state that the man was plotting a mass shooting with her.
CBS’ San Diego affiliate KFMB-TV reported that law enforcement searched the man’s home Tuesday night after the order was signed by the judge.
Police, with the assistance of the FBI, were scouring online records and other resources and speaking with the shooter’s parents and classmates in an attempt to determine a motive for the shooting, Barnes told the AP.
Police don’t know if anyone was targeted in the attack or if the attack had been planned in advance, the chief said. Police said the shooting occurred in a classroom where a study hall was taking place involving students from several grades.
“I do not know if if she planned it that day or if she planned it a week prior,” Barnes said. “To me, bringing a gun to school to hurt people is planning. And so we don’t know what the premeditation is.”
On a Madison city website providing details about the shooting, police disclosed Wednesday that two guns were found at the school, but only one was used in the shooting. A law enforcement source previously told CBS News the weapon used appears to have been a 9 mm pistol.
Barnes told the AP that he did not know how the suspected shooter obtained the guns and he declined to say who purchased them, citing the ongoing investigation.
No decisions have been made about whether Rupnow’s parents might be charged in relation to the shooting, but they have been cooperating, Barnes told the AP.
Abundant Life is a nondenominational Christian school that offers prekindergarten classes through high school. About 420 students attend the institution.
The Dan County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the two people killed Wednesday as 42-year-old Erin West and 14-year-old Rubi Vergara.
An online obituary on a local funeral site stated Vergara was a freshman who leaves behind her parents, one brother, and a large extended family. It described her as “an avid reader” who “loved art, singing and playing keyboard in the family worship band.”
West’s exact position with the school was unclear.
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