A woman is suing the TSA and Frontier Airlines after she was illegally strip-searched at Detroit Metro Airport on the tenth anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan is filing a lawsuit on behalf of Shoshana Hebshi, a 36-year-old woman of Arab and Jewish descent who believes she was targeted because of her appearance, CBS reports.
Hebshi, along with two Indian-American men were handcuffed and removed from their Frontier Airlines flight when it landed in Detroit on Sept. 11, 2011. Hebshi and the men were removed because one of the men got sick and went into the bathroom. The other man headed to the bathroom around the same time. The flight crew was on alert as the men were out of their seats for a long period.
The crew reported suspicious activity and two F-16 fighter jets escorted the plane to Detroit.
No charges were ever filed against any of the three passengers, but the woman is now suing airport officials, Frontier Airlines, and various federal authorities, including the TSA and the FBI.
Hebshi happened to be sitting in the same row as the men. She didn't know them, but she was removed from the flight, held in a jail cell, strip-searched and questioned for four-hours before she was released. The FBI did not find a reason to suspect her of any involvement with illegal activity. No charges were filed against the two men either.
Hebshi was held without cause and she believes it was purely because of her ethnicity.
"I was frightened and humiliated, and my rights were clearly violated solely because of my ethnicity," Hebshi said in a statement, according to Consumerist. "As an American citizen and a mom, I'm really concerned about my children growing up in a country where your skin color and name can put your freedom and liberty at risk at any time. This kind of discrimination should not be tolerated."
Frontier Airlines claims their employees didn't do anything wrong and that "there was no profiling of any kind associated with this incident other than that of unusual and suspicious behavior," according to Consumerist.
ACLU is continuing with the lawsuit for an unreasonable search and seizure and decrimination prohibited by federal civil rights laws against Frontier, the TSA, Wayne Country Airport Authority, Detroit Metro Airport Police, the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Patrol.
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