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cb1000rider wrote:

VMI77 wrote: Yes, but if you're taking that pic through the window with a telephoto lens, it may not be so clear cut. Once, seeing my son off, I spent some time waiting for the plane taking photos and videos inside the Austin airport --including photos of the TSA station and TSA personnel. No one said a word. Then, when leaving, I stopped to take a photo outside where cabs were depositing people, and got hassled by a rent-a-cop who acted like I was a potential "terrorist." I asked her, are you telling me I'm doing something illegal? She said no. I asked her if she wanted to look through the photos and she said no. So, it had nothing to do with security or the law, it was just another small minded person who felt powerful because she was wearing a uniform that said "security" on it.

It also has to do with our state of mind as a nation. She could have easily escalated her suspicions and you would have found yourself in handcuffs detained for quite a while... In the event that such happened, you did nothing wrong, she did nothing wrong, but the constitution gets steam-rolled.

To me it's not much different than the days of the "red scare" where being called a communist would get you in lots of trouble.

I have a friend. He's a software guy and a US citizen. English is his 2nd language, although he was born here. He's a brown man. He's big into guns and 2nd amendment rights. Lots of ARs and "assault" looking weapons. One day coming back from the gun range I teased him that it wouldn't be very pleasant for him (in the current state of the world) if he was stopped due to being reported as suspicious... I wouldn't do that to him, but I bet that he'd be in for one heck of a ride with a trunkful of AR-15s, even if he could prove he was coming from the range... It's just the nature of our society these days to label anything we don't like with "terrorist" and use that word to trample on basic rights.

bdickens wrote:More than one Supreme Court decision has held that individuals explicitly have the right to photograph anything they can see from public property they have the right to be on.

If I am standing on the sidewalk and you have no curtains on your giant picture window, I can take all the pictures I want of what's going on in your living room and you have no legal recourse.

One time, my wife and I were walking around downtown Houston taking pictures and some rent-a-cop came out of one of the buildings trying to keep us from taking pictures of it. I pretty much told him to go pound sand.

cb1000rider wrote:

philip964 wrote:Since we are talking about Amtrak, I will relate a story of an acquaintance.

Story snipped..
You're speaking of James Bourgeois:
But the bottom line is that he wasn't arrested for taking photos. He was arrested for trespassing... Of course, the area that he was trespassing in wasn't posted from the terminal where he got off.

Mr. Bourgeois was warned that he was trespassing and then arrested when he suggested that Amtrak was publically funded.

Sounds like a POP arrest to me, but the fact is that he was arrested for trespassing, not taking photos. The only thing I can see in dispute was if the PD can arrest in an area that isn't properly posted.

It's no different than getting arrested in an area like a mall, where the front entrance has 30.06 signs and you choose to come in one of the side entrances.

Amtrak has arrested people in NY for similar (harmless) activities...


Still, as a pilot,I'll take Amtrak over the TSA any day.

The taking of photographs and/or videos is permitted within public access areas on Amtrak property and as otherwise stated in Section III.

Public Area. An area open to general public access and occupancy (station areas and platforms for ticketed passengers only) that is not otherwise posted or restricted by posted signs or locking devices. Signage, building design and physical barriers, i.e. fencing, bollards, etc., may also distinguish a public area from a restricted area.

Ticketed Passengers on platforms may photograph or video record during the time they are preparing to board or immediately after alighting from a train. Equipment is limited to hand-held devices. Such photography, including equipment set-up will be done in a reasonable, safe and timely manner.

Ticketed passengers on board trains may take photos or video record on a train when it does not interfere with passengers or crew and in accordance with any directions given by Amtrak onboard train personnel.

Slowplay wrote:I travel a lot and it's truly disgusting to see, on many occasions, more blue shirts at security theatre checkpoints than traveling passengers. It's very obvious there is very poor management of how they allocate their labor resources (and I use that term very loosely). TSA is just another bloated federal program with an unwritten mission to make itself even larger.

Another apparent mission is to make their blue shirt presence as widespread and transgressing (4th Amend.) as possible. It must be part of a National Overt Transportation Security Initiative. The blue shirts will be everywhere and always in our business, in order to keep us safe.