http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/us...pagewanted=all
"Ve vant to see your papers...."
......"Civil liberties groups say that the VIPR teams have little to do with the agency?s original mission to provide security screenings at airports and that in some cases their actions amount to warrantless searches in violation of constitutional protections.
?The problem with T.S.A. stopping and searching people in public places outside the airport is that there are no real legal standards, or probable cause,? said Khaliah Barnes, administrative law counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. ?It?s something that is easily abused because the reason that they are conducting the stops is shrouded in secrecy.?
T.S.A. officials respond that the random searches are ?special needs? or ?administrative searches? that are exempt from probable cause because they further the government?s need to prevent terrorist attacks.
Created in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the T.S.A. has grown to an agency of 56,000 people at 450 American airports. The VIPR teams were started in 2005, in part as a reaction to the Madrid train bombing in 2004 that killed 191 people.
The program now has a $100 million annual budget and is growing rapidly, increasing to several hundred people and 37 teams last year, up from 10 teams in 2008. T.S.A. records show that the teams ran more than 8,800 unannounced checkpoints and search operations with local law enforcement outside of airports last year, including those at the Indianapolis 500 and the Democratic and Republican national political conventions.
The teams, which are typically composed of federal air marshals, explosives experts and baggage inspectors, move through crowds with bomb-sniffing dogs, randomly stop passengers and ask security questions. "......
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