Female TSA agent groped traveler during ‘groin search’ at NC airport, lawsuit says
A woman flying home to Los Angeles was flagged for a pat down when she went through security at an airport in North Carolina, according to court documents.
That’s when a female TSA agent sexually assaulted her, the woman says.
The officer “unlawfully touched (her) genitals, effectively sexually assaulting (her) in the middle of an airport,” according to a complaint filed Tuesday in Western North Carolina federal court.
The woman was reportedly traveling through Asheville Regional Airport on June 27, 2019, when the incident occurred.
Attorneys for the woman and a TSA spokesperson declined to comment Thursday. A representative for the airport did not immediately respond to a request for comment by McClatchy News.
According to the lawsuit, the traveler arrived at the airport around 1 p.m. with a boarding pass to L.A. and proceeded to security.
She went through a body scanner and was told she’d need to submit to a “groin search,” the complaint states.
Pat-downs by TSA can include “sensitive areas such as breasts, groin and the buttocks,” according to the Transportation Security Administration website. Agents are supposed to advise travelers on the procedure “to help you anticipate any actions before you feel them.”
The woman asked whether the groin search would require the agent “touching her genitals” and expressly did not give her consent to be touched there, her attorneys said in the lawsuit.
The agent reportedly said the search “would not require such touching.”
But according to the complaint, “TSA procedure for ‘groin searches’ as a result of body scanner anomalies does involve direct contact with the genitals of travelers” — including “sliding” and “swiping.”
“Sliding” requires the TSA agent to slide their hand inside a traveler’s leg until it meets resistance, attorneys for the woman said in the suit. Agents can also swipe with the back of their hand along the front of a traveler’s pants.
The TSA agent at Asheville Regional Airport deviated from that protocol in four different ways, the complaint states.
According to the lawsuit, the woman was required to spread her legs “in an abnormally wide manner” beyond where the footprints on the mat indicated she should stand. The agent then reportedly slid her hands inside the woman’s shorts “to fondle” her.
While this was happening, attorneys for the woman say, the TSA agent made a comment about how short her shorts were. The agent then threatened to repeat the procedure when the woman flinched, saying, “If you resist, I will do this again,” the complaint states.
The TSA agent also used the front of her hands to conduct the “swiping” portion of the pat down and “made contact with (the traveler’s) vulva using the front of her hands and her fingertips,” according to the lawsuit.
She did so for sexual gratification while also trying to “humiliate, dominate and control” the woman, attorneys said in the complaint.
The lawsuit makes claims against the United States and the TSA agent for civil battery and unreasonable search.
