Brooklyn case opens door for changes to federal airport security

January 7, 2015 By Charisma L. Troiano, Esq. Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., listens at left as Brooklyn District Attorney Kenneth Thompson speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday. Schumer is calling for daily federal screening of airport and airline workers for weapons following last month’s arrests of five men accused of smuggling guns through the New York and Atlanta airports. AP Photo/Susan Walsh

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A Brooklyn investigation into a gun-smuggling scheme that led to arrests in the borough and reached across state lines to Georgia is now being used as a rallying cry for federal changes to airport security.

Brooklyn District Attorney Kenneth Thompson was in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday to discuss the efforts of his administration. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-Brooklyn) joined Thompson at a press conference where the U.S. senator called for daily federal screening of airport and airline workers for illicit guns following last month’s arrests of five men accused of gun running through the New York and Atlanta airports.

In December, four men were charged in two separate indictments for allegedly conspiring to sell 153 firearms — almost all of which were purchased in Georgia and destined for the streets of Brooklyn.

The investigation uncovered a breach in security at Atlanta and New York area airports where airline employees allegedly brought backpacks and carry-on luggage loaded with firearms onto commercial flights. During the eight-month investigation, more than 150 guns were recovered that had been smuggled through Atlanta-New York airport routes.

According to Schumer, D.A. Thompson’s investigation revealed an airport security loophole. Currently, pilots and flight crews pass through the TSA metal detectors, as well as passengers. But Schumer said many employees who work in the secure sections of airports are exempt.

“D.A. Thompson’s groundbreaking investigation underscores that clearly, the TSA should require all airline employees to be physically screened each day before entering secure airport areas,” Schumer said Wednesday.

Guns in Airports a ‘Cake Walk’

During the course of the Brooklyn investigation it was discovered that defendant Mark Henry, a resident of Canarsie, Brooklyn, made 17 trips between New York airports and Atlanta, Ga., between May 8, 2014, and Dec. 10, 2014. Henry, it has been reported, worked as a ramp agent for Delta between 2007 and 2010 and was aware of weaknesses in the security system protocols. It is alleged that Henry would purchase firearms from an online seller, purchasing between 10 and 20 guns at a time, and retrieve the weapons from sellers in and around Atlanta, Ga. Then, with the assistance of the defendant and Georgia resident ‎Eugene Harvey, who was also working as a Delta ramp agent, he would fly to New York with the weapons on the plane.
Henry would clear security as an ordinary passenger. Once on the other side of the security check, Harvey would go inside the airport and allegedly give Henry back the guns in exchange for cash.

Harvey, not required to pass through TSA security at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, would simply take the bags of weapons through the employee entrances and into the secure areas of the airport prior to the exchange.

“This scheme was a cake walk due to major loopholes in security protocols at airports,” said the senator.

“The ease by which airport employees are able to smuggle weapons and other contraband onto our commercial airliners is troubling and warrants immediate scrutiny and inspection,” Thompson said at the D.C. press conference.

Calling for reform, Thompson and Schumer asked that TSA immediately implement a national requirement that all airports physically screen airline and airport employees each day before they enter secured areas of airports.

“When guns, drugs and even explosives are as easy to carry on board a plane as a neck pillow, then we have to seriously — and immediately — overhaul our airport security practices,” the senator said.

Thompson chimed in that “[o]ur investigation, in cooperation with the NYPD and our federal law enforcement partners, identified gaping holes in our nation’s airport security. In this age of terrorism, basic protections such as screening airport employees, is critical to the safety of our country.”

Federal Focus on Terrorism, Brooklyn Focus on Guns

Schumer noted that the TSA security loophole “goes beyond … rampant drug dealing and gun smuggling,” pointing to the possibility that the security gap could be used for explosives or other agents of terrorism.”

It’s likely that Schumer used the Brooklyn case and a push for TSA reform as a backdoor way to propel a base level of federal gun reform. Comprehensive gun reform legislative efforts have failed in Congress since the mass shooting in Newtown, Conn. In a response to a question by the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Schumer noted that his office supports both federal gun reform efforts and as acts by local authorities to reduce the supply of guns on the streets. He restated the need for action by the TSA.

Thompson, however, focused on his priority of getting guns off the streets of Brooklyn. “In Brooklyn, we are not content with just arresting a gun dealer on the streets of Brooklyn,” said the D.A. “We follow the lead because we want to get to the source of these guns. We have a gun issue in this country, we have to get to the source of guns.”

Security Checks for All

Thompson and Schumer explained that TSA does require that flight crew and pilots be screened, but no physical screening is required for employees who enter into secured areas of an airport such as post-security terminals at gates, the tarmac and ramps and at vendors.

“It is ridiculous that passengers cannot get on a plane with a bottle of lotion or water, but people are getting on planes with guns in their backpacks,” Thompson said, noting the irony in screening requirements.

Thompson and Schumer pointed to the fact that Atlanta’s airport’s security did not require physical screening of employees before entering secured areas demonstrated a need for serious security overhauls nationwide. At New York area airports, employees are physically screened in some cases but not in every instance — the rules vary by employee and terminal.

In a recent letter to TSA Director John Pistole, Schumer requested a nationwide overhaul to security at airports and daily federal screening of airport and airline workers. “As head of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), I ask that you implement a national requirement that airline employees go through physical screening each and every time they enter the secure areas of an airport,” Schumer wrote in his January letter.

Schumer assured that TSA has the legal authority to institute such changes.

TSA presently requires background checks of all airport employees and relies on this measure to weed out any potential security risks posed by an employee, but Thompson and Schumer called for more stringent checks. “Each and every airport nationwide should be required to develop a comprehensive physical screening procedure for employees as soon as possible,” Schumer’s letter stated.

Both officials lauded the work done by TSA agents in keeping airports and passenger safe, but Schumer added, “D.A. Thompson’s case has revealed that we must do a little bit more: everyone entering an airport should be subject to physical screening, regardless of whether they are a passenger or an employee.”