Posted on 11/19/2001 11:43:39 AM PST by 11th Earl of Mar
Edited on 09/03/2002 4:49:34 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
U.S. Attorney's office decides to leave the matter with local authorities
By CRAIG SCHNEIDER and BILL TORPY
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff Writers
The man who brought Hartsfield airport to a standstill last week said Monday he's sorry for the problems he caused and that his actions were motivated by concern for his son.
"I deeply regret the inconvenience to a number of people that was caused Friday -- all arising from my concern for my son waiting for me at the gate," Lasseter said from his home in Gainesville.
"All we're trying to do is return to life as normal as we can," he said as he stood outside his home, dressed in khaki pants and a golf shirt. He said he hoped the media would allow him and his family to do that.
Lasseter, 32, also discounted media reports that a co-worker at the bank where he's employed was furious at him for being delayed at the airport along with several thousand other travelers. "There is no man at the bank," he said.
Lasseter said there had been a steady stream of reporters visiting his home over the weekend. He also said he'd hired an attorney but would not say who that was.
Asked about the media stress on him and his family, he said, "It's been tiring."
Hartsfield was closed for more than three hours Friday after Lasseter ran back from a secured area to retrieve a forgotten video camera, then breached security in trying to reach his flight. Airport security evacuated as many as 10,000 passengers from the terminal and canceled, rerouted and delayed incoming and outgoing flights.
Lasseter's flight, however, took off with his 6-year-old son, Grant, on board, along with Lasseter's nephew, 8, and his wife's uncle.
When the incident at Hartsfield occurred, Lasseter and his relatives were catching a flight to Memphis and planning to drive 84 miles to Oxford, Miss., to attend the Georgia-Mississippi game Saturday.
Lasseter was released from the Clayton County Jail early Saturday after posting a $11,500 property bond on a charge of disorderly conduct. He called his mother to tell her he was all right, then drove to Oxford, Cathryn Lasseter said.
As for his legal troubles, Lasseter has been charged with disorderly conduct and his case is being handled by Clayton County Solicitor Keith Mason, whose office prosecutes misdemeanors. It is not clear whether any additional misdemeanor charges will be levied against Lasseter.
The U.S. Attorney's office has decided to leave the matter in the hands of local authorities. "There was no real obvious, specific federal charge" that could be pursued against him, said Patrick Crosby, spokesman for the office.
Passengers who were at the airport Friday continually grumbled about mob justice for the then-unidentified man who caused the shutdown.
Kent Williams of Arlington Va., who stood about 250th in line at the United Airlines ticketing window, was a bit more lenient than the others - maybe.
"If they catch the guy, don't fine him, don't jail him," Williams said Friday. "Just sit him down in a room and let everybody here at the airport get just one minute each to talk to him. By the 30,000th person, I think he'd get the point."
No, but he didn't, so what's the point?
You have NO way of knowing that he didn't -- that IS the point.
The point was that the security folks don't know why someone runs past them. They have to figure that it had to be illegal because NOBODY is stupid enough to do this without a really good reason. For all they knew he had a gun or a bomb. He could have passed it on to someone else already in the terminal or hid it in a rest room and picked it up later.
If they hadn't reacted the way they did then why even have security? Just let the folks who want to go through the security screening and those that don't can run around it without any reaction.
Here's a quick question. Your plane is departing in 10 minutes. You're waiting with your young son and another relative when you realize you left your camera bag somewhere in the airport. Do you go after the bag or board the plane and call later?
Personally, I'd board the plane and try to retrieve it through lost and found. By the way, are we talking camera and bag or just bag? It wouldn't make a difference to me if it was both, I'd still board (unless the camera were valuable enough to miss the flight over), but if it were just the bag, good grief!
Ferget punishing this guy, they should give him a $1000 reward for demonstrating how bad security is there. If some idiot can, on a whim, blast through security in full view of numerous guards & cameras, and the breach is considered serious enough to shut down the entire airport, then the security staff responsible is clearly & demonstrably incompetent and should be replaced.
I think the whole "inanimate object control" model of airport security is misguided...but if they're going to use it, they should do it right. This guy showed it was done very wrong.
He is apologetic, but he did it for the children , sounds like a Clinton excuse. Arrogant jerks like Lasseter are always cutting corners, running red lights, and causing mayhem because of their self-centered nature. Beside his child was with an Uncle, is the uncle not to be trusted with children??? Excuses!
No he didn't. He committed an act over which others panicked. The end result is a major bit of disruption, but "criminal"? Certainly not one which would have previously been considered serious. So should you be sent "to jail for a very long time" because the world around you changed?
But he did not commit a crime with weapons in your example.
No, that's not true. He then would have committed the felony of having weapons in a secure zone, in addition to his other crimes, in that hypothetical case.
My point was that he committed a serious crime, and that it really shouldn't be seen as "innocent" because such an action as running past security could have caused awful consequences for other people. If hundreds of other people ran past security to "save time," and some weren't caught, would you feel the same about such a security breach?
He inconvenienced thousands of people for his own selfish gain. Hundreds or thousands of people will have missed flight connections and may even have had trouble rescheduling their flights, and may have missed important events. Airlines and businesses lost money. It's not so innocent.
If other people decide to copy his example, airport security will be even more overburdened and air travel will become impossibly difficult. He deserves far more punishment than a $1000 fine.
Commutative property: Do you mean "If he had committed several crimes would it still be an innocent crime?"
What? So everyone is guilty of a serious crime unless we can prove that they didn't? helenny said that he should be punished as if he committed a serious crime because he could have had weapons. But he didn't. Ya know what? You could have gone and been a straw-man purchaser of guns for terrorists last weekend. We have no way of knowing that you didn't, so you should be arrested.
Come on. Are you serious? Even an ex felon has the right to pursue economic prosperity. Are you saying that this guy's behaviour falls into an entirely new category and that we should torment him forever and make sure he never lives above the poverty line? What about his family? We should punish them? This guy might've been a totally productive member of society for all any of us know. But we should treat him worse than a crack dealer?
I thought airport security was a pain in the butt before 9/11 and I haven't changed my mind at all since then. We should either destroy all terrorists or at least eliminate them from our country. If we start treating our ordinary citizens like terrorists instead of taking the other measures- what then? Why do we not do the necessary things to the necessary people- ie the radical anti American crowd? Why torment American citizenry for Bin Laden's dementia?
America is the "me first nation". That's why I love it. Freedom of the individual and all "that stuff" that the left hates so much. It's a dangerous road we're going down if we start sacrificing people on the altars of fear.
Those who lost money because of this clown should discover his whereabouts and then demand financial restitution. Through litigation if necessary.
I figured either it was a typo, or he actually meant it in the medeival meaning of the word...from which the term 'tooling around' comes from.
Amen! The guy didn't bust security. He went down and up escalator and was running. Over reactive idiots saw him and shut down the aiport for 4 hours. Not only the airport but all traffic on the freeway. It will cost the airlines millions of dollars and some more lay offs could come out of this.
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