Move Tied To Violations Of Procedures For Screening Checked Bags

TSA says 25 employees at Newark Airport will lose their jobs and 19 more will be suspended because of violations of "standard operating procedures for screening checked bags at one of the airports 25 baggage screening rooms." Offenses range from sleeping on the job to failure to consistently perform random screening of checked bags.

TSA said that the job actions are not related to a very critical secret internal document which shows that agents at Newark Liberty Airport only conducted proper pat-down searches of passengers 16.7 percent of the time, and only identified and took appropriate action on prohibited items in 25 percent of all instances, which was the subject of a report in the New Jersey Star Ledger. ABC News reports that TSA said that the firings are the result of a year-long internal investigation that was prompted by alleged thefts by a TSA officer.

A statement released by TSA contained the boilerplate language that the agency "has a zero tolerance for misconduct in the workplace," going on to say that the agency "takes prompt and appropriate action with any employee who does not follow our procedures and engages in misconduct."

A recent ABC news investigative report indicates that over the 10 years of its existence, the agency has let 382 employees go for stealing items from passenger's luggage. One admitted that he had taken some $800,000 in money and other valuables from luggage he was supposed to be screening ... and for which he spent three years in prison.

That agent, Pythias Brown, said it was "easy" to steal from the luggage being screened, and said it began because of poor pay and morale at the agency. He said the problem became "massive" when people saw they could profit from the thefts.

FMI: www.tsa.gov