kitchiek
US Marshall's They Targeted the Wrong Guys
Sat Sep 21 20:30:51 2002
208.152.73.211

US Marshall's They Targeted the Wrong Guys
Date: Sat, 21 Sep 2002 18:17:16 -0000
From: "kitchiek" kitchie@worldnet.att.net


Now keep in mind the US Marshall's did similar things on a flight out
of Denver. Took everyone on board as hostages. What better way for
a hijacker to leagally grab a plane than to pose as an Air Marshall!

Kitchie

Profiling charged on 'nightmare' flight
A doctor on Delta Flight 442 was detained by U.S. marshals.
By THOMAS GINSBERG
Philadelphia Inquirer

The incident on Delta Flight 442 was scary enough last month: U.S.
marshals seized an unruly passenger, then one aimed a pistol at other
passengers for a half hour and shouted at them to stay seated.

The event, however, didn't end there. Unknown to most passengers on
the Atlanta-to-Philadelphia flight, the marshals upon landing also
seized an Indian passenger from first class and silently whisked him
away in handcuffs.

Far from being a terror suspect, the second detainee turned out to be
a former U.S. Army major and military doctor from Lake Worth, Fla.,
where he has had a family practice for two decades. Both detainees
later were released without charge, and the physician's angry account
of his ordeal offers a glimpse at the dark side of America's war on
terrorism.

Yesterday, suggesting that the line between security and civil-rights
violations is blurring, the physician, Bob Rajcoomar, filed notice in
U.S. District Court that he may sue the U.S. government for illegal
detention and emotional distress. His wife had been left to wander the
Philadelphia airport for three hours during his detention, never told
of his whereabouts.

"This is blatant racial profiling," Rajcoomar, a naturalized citizen
since 1985, said by telephone from Florida. "They think they can pick
up anybody, willy-nilly... . It's not in keeping with traditions of
the United States."

David Steigman, a spokesmen for the newly created U.S. Transportation
Safety Administration, which oversees the air marshals, gave few
details about the detentions or the marshals' actions and declined to
discuss the potential lawsuit. Atlanta-based Delta did not comment on
the legal action.

Rajcoomar, "to the best of our knowledge, had been observing too
closely. When the aircraft landed, the airline declined to press
charges" against either man, Steigman said.

Stefan Presser, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union
of Pennsylvania, which filed the lawsuit notice, called the detention
a civil-rights violation that should "send a wake-up call to Americans
before it's too late... . In our haste to protect ourselves, we are
literally turning on each other."

The dramatic hours on Aug. 31 aboard Delta Flight 442 started when a
passenger from Philadelphia - described as waiflike and disturbed -
caused alarm when he began looking at other passengers' luggage.

Two U.S. air marshals rushed back from their first-class seats to
investigate. The marshals were later identified by police as Shawn B.
McCullers and Samuel Mumma, assigned to the regional Transportation
Safety Administration office in Atlantic City, which declined to
discuss the case.

"Air marshals issued a series of warnings to passengers to stay in
their seats. The unruly gentleman didn't stay in his seat, so they
took action to restrain him," Steigman said.

Rajcoomar, sitting in window seat 1-D, reading a book and sipping a
beer, said he knew nothing until the marshals showed up and began
pushing the unruly man into seat 1-C, adjacent to his.

Alarmed, Rajcoomar said he stood up and asked to be moved. A flight
attendant told him to take one of the first-class seats vacated by the
marshals.

"One [marshal] sat on the guy in the first seat; he was groaning, and
the more he groaned, the more they twisted the handcuffs," Rajcoomar
said.

Then, in coach class, a woman rose to switch seats with her child, who
was sitting in an aisle seat, according to Rajcoomar's wife, Dorothy,
who was sitting in coach class because the couple could not get seats
together.

"That's when they started hollering," Dorothy Rajcoomar said of the
marshals. One of them rushed to the divider between the first-class
and coach sections and leveled his pistol at the coach-class
passengers.

"He took control as if he was a terrorist himself," said Bob
Rajcoomar,who was then sitting in a first-class aisle seat directly
in front of the marshal. "He says, 'Nobody move, nobody look down the
aisle, nobody take pictures or you will go to jail, nobody do
anything.' He basically hijacked everybody."

One passenger, Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge James Lineberger,
said marshals "were yelling at passengers to keep their heads and
hands out of the aisle... . I couldn't believe they would do such a
thing."

Bob Rajcoomar said he, like every other passenger, was watching the
marshal but never spoke to him.

About 30 minutes later, the plane landed and Philadelphia police
officers came aboard to help take away the unruly man. Thinking the
incident was over, passengers began standing up, Rajcoomar said.

"Then out of nowhere, hell broke loose," Rajcoomar said. "One of these
marshals came down to me and said, 'Head down, hands over your head!'
They pushed my head down, told me to bend down... . I just couldn't
believe it. I was speechless, in shock."

Unseen by his wife 30 rows back, Rajcoomar was whisked off the plane,
taken to an airport police station, and locked in a cell he called so
filthy "I wouldn't even put my dog in it."

During detention, Rajcoomar said, he was never asked anything except
his name, address and Social Security number. He asked why he was
being held.

"One of the marshals said something like, 'We didn't like the way you
looked,' " Rajcoomar recalled. "They also said something like, 'We
didn't like the way you looked at us.' "

Finally, after about three hours, Rajcoomar was released without
explanation.

"It was like a nightmare," Rajcoomar said. "The marshals were
completely out of control... . If they had pulled the trigger, we'd
all be dead. I don't feel safe knowing they're there, not with this
kind of behavior."
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Contact Thomas Ginsberg at 215-854-4177 or tginsberg@p...

Secret Service AFAUSSS Directory
http://www.apfn.org/USSS/usss.pdf


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• BAGHDAD JANE | Ritter of Arabia — AvIntel, Sat Sep 21 20:41