A journey interrupted
Profiling or a good call. From the
St. Petersburg Times:
Man's vacation takes a detour
A Palestinian raises suspicion on an arriving plane. Police are called. He is jailed on a separate warrant.
Maybe it was his desire to stand and stretch in the airplane.
Maybe it was the gruesome images of torture he watched on his laptop that caught attention.
Something about Iyad Abuhajjaj's behavior on a Southwest Airlines flight from Phoenix to Tampa on Wednesday afternoon concerned airline officials enough to call police.
Police have not accused Abuhajjaj, 36, of any wrongdoing on the plane, but a search of his name revealed an Okaloosa County warrant for his arrest.
On Thursday, the Palestinian health care worker and actor who lives in California was held without bail in the Hillsborough County jail. Deputies say Abuhajjaj met a Florida woman online in 2002, threatened her and used her AOL account without permission.
In a jail interview, he told a reporter he suspected he was singled out on the plane because of his thick accent, dark hair and olive skin.
"I felt like it was because of my ethnic background," he said. "The accent, that's probably it. It could be my look, my accent, I can't say for sure."
A Southwest Airlines spokeswoman said a report on the incident was not finished. She said the airline does not discriminate or single anyone out for their race or ethnic background.
Showing a video of torture on a laptop. Was he just watching it or did he have some video editing software open and he was actually working on it. And have they confirmed the film project.
A bit more:
When a computer search showed the warrant, Abuhajjaj was taken to jail on charges stemming from accusations made against him in 2002 by a woman in Fort Walton Beach.
Kimberly M. Mathis, a 29-year-old teacher at Rocky Bayou Christian School, accused him of threatening to kill her and misusing her family's Internet account.
Sounds like a good case for someone to be sent packing. People who threaten other people's lives should not be welcome in this country.
Posted by DaveH at March 2, 2007 9:21 PM