LIHUE – There is not much of the world Richard Slaven hasn’t seen. His passport stamps go from South America to India to Asia. Slaven was scoping out Kauai in January in hopes of possibly setting up a second home
LIHUE – There is not much of the world Richard Slaven hasn’t seen.
His passport stamps go from South America to India to Asia. Slaven was scoping out Kauai in January in hopes of possibly setting up a second home on the Garden Island.
“I absolutely love Kauai. It’s paradise,” said Slaven. “It is the most beautiful of all the islands.”
But when it comes to airport security, he’s not quite so thrilled.
Upon leaving, Slaven said he approached the security check-in point and told them he preferred not to walk through the scanner because of his claustrophobia. From that point on, he was plagued with what he considers to be timed and calculated harassment.
“It looks like they want to punish those people who don’t want to go through the scanner,” he said.
He said security gave him what he called an “aggressive” pat down, and swabbed his fingers three times for a drug test.
“Something that has never happened to me over the past five years,” he said.
Thinking all was well, he proceeded to the gate. He said it was one hour prior to his departure. When it came time to board, he approached the check-in counter and heard his name being paged.
“Then two burly-looking security guards approached and said there were locks on my check-in baggage and they needed me to return to the luggage check-in point,” Slaven said. “I wasn’t going to miss my flight and told them to cut the locks.”
Which they did. His baggage arrived safely in San Diego, with all four of the locks on it having been cut.
Transportation Security Administration spokesman Nico Melendez said that it sounds like proper procedures were followed.
“If a person opts out of the scanner procedure, they get a pat down,” said Melendez.
He is investigating Slaven’s allegations of harassment and has contacted the Lihue Airport.
“We’ve been screening people for 11 years,” said Melendez. “From what I can tell at first glance at his email, I see some things don’t sound consistent with our policies. I’ve never heard of this happening.”
He added that TSA doesn’t ask for permission to cut locks, they just do it.
