Pierced flyer wins a victory after humiliating search

A Dallas area woman who was forced to remove her nipple piercings, but not ber navel piercing February 24 won a reprieve for all other pierced flyers. Mandi Hamlin, 37, was forced to remove her piercings during a flight from Lubbock to LA, all the while male TSA agents allegedly laughed.

Her attorney, Gloria Allred of Los Angeles, said her client needed pliers to remove one nipple ring after the jewelry set off a screener's handheld metal detector.

Hamlin told the officer she had nipple piercings, Allred said, and that officer called over another officer, who told her she would need to remove them.

"Ms. Hamlin did not want to remove her nipple piercings," Allred said, reading from a letter she sent TSA. "After nipple rings are inserted, the skin can often heal around the piercing and the rings can be extremely difficult and painful to remove. In addition, once removed, the pierced skin may close up almost immediately, making it difficult and painful to reinsert the piercing."

More officers were called over, and the group grew to four male and two female TSA officers, according to Hamlin. Also, a small crowd of onlookers had started to gather. The officers insisted that Hamlin remove the nipple rings, Allred said.
"She felt humiliated by the scene that the TSA officers were making," Allred said.

"With tears streaming down her face, she again asked to show the piercings to a TSA officer instead of having to remove them. She was told, however, she would not be allowed to fly unless she removed them. Had she been told that she had a right to a pat-down, she would have chosen that option."

She eventually was taken to a private area behind a curtain to remove the piercings, Allred said. One came out easily, but the other would not, and she called to an officer that she was having trouble and would need pliers. She was handed a large pair, Allred said.

"As Ms. Hamlin struggled to remove the piercing, behind the curtain she could hear a growing number of predominately male TSA officers snickering in the background," Allred said in the letter.

"Mandi Hamlin was publicly humiliated. ... Clearly, this is not how passengers should be treated."
Afterward, Hamlin underwent another scan, but realized she had forgotten to remove her navel ring. She offered to remove it, Allred said, but an officer told her it was not necessary because he could see it. Hamlin wondered why a similar visual inspection of her nipple rings would not have sufficed, Allred said.

"I wouldn't wish this experience upon anyone," Hamlin told reporters. "I felt surprised, embarrassed, humiliated and scared. No one deserves to go through this."

The officers "rightly insisted that the alarm that was raised be resolved," the TSA said in a statement posted on its Web site Friday afternoon. "TSA supports the thoroughness of the officers involved as they were acting to protect the passengers and crews of the flights departing Lubbock that day."

However, "TSA has reviewed the procedures themselves and agrees that they need to be changed," the statement said. "In the future, TSA will inform passengers that they have the option to resolve the alarm through a visual inspection of the article in lieu of removing the item in question."

The TSA said Friday that though its procedures were properly followed in Ms. Hamlin's case, they "caused difficulty for the passenger involved and ... [the TSA] regrets the situation in which she found herself. We appreciate her raising awareness on this issue and we are changing the procedures to ensure that this does not happen again."

The agency said that in the future, passengers will be informed they have the option to undergo a visual inspection, rather than remove such jewelry.

Ms. Allred commended the agency for its prompt action.
"Within 24 hours, to have change in policy nationwide is an awesome achievement," she said.
Ms. Hamlin and her attorney said they will take no further legal action.