Mother Accuses Agent at Norman Manley Airport in Kingston, Jamaica, of Traumatizing 12 Year Old Daughter During Body Search

Mother files complaint against Airports Authority of Jamaica saying her 12 year old daughter was violated during invasive body search, with no relatives present.

The Airports Authority of Jamaica is getting some negative public relations that it would love to forget. A mother has claimed her 12 year old daughter was subjected to an embarrassing body search Monday at the Norman Manley International Airport located in Kingston, Jamaica. She said her daughter's privacy was violated at a security checkpoint at the airport and she isn't taking it lightly and I can't say I blame her. So, I'm doing my part to get the news out there as well. This is ridiculous and I think the Jamaican government is going overboard with these over-the-top searches, while criminals run rampant in some areas of the country.

The mother, who The Gleaner has chosen not to name to protect her daughter's identity, filed a complaint with the Airports Authority, noting that a female security officer asked the child to remove her pants and underwear following an upper-body pat-down search.

In her email to Lieutenant Commander John McFarlane, director of aviation security, the mother wrote: "(The officer) then questioned her about her menses, then told her to reclothe herself."

The mother said she was appalled at what her daughter went through, and would now tell her child to be obedient to no one except her parents.

"My poor little daughter had to put herself through that," she said, also noting that she had not received a response from McFarlane.

However, McFarlane told The Gleaner yesterday that what the child experienced was a close body search and the Airports Authority was "aggressively" pursuing the claim.

"Anybody can be searched," he said, noting there was no age restriction. "Unfortunately, we've seen incidents where two-year-olds ingested cocaine for trafficking. It is very sad." Source: Jamaica Gleaner

Like some TSA officers here in the U.S.A., some of the agents in Jamaica are arrogant and go overboard with the whole issue of security. I hope the mother gets the satisfaction she deserves from her complaint and it will serve as a deterrent to other agents who feel they are the big Kahuna and the buck stops with he or she. The child is a minor, why wasn't a relative allowed to watch the agent do such an invasive search? Anything could have happened. She could have been sexually molested. Shameful, shameful.