MIT student arrested at Boston airport for wearing fake bomb

<p>WEARING an electronic device at LOGAN, of all places? That airport is still feeling guilty because 2 of the 9/11 hijackers took off from there. No one lets them forget that - and they shouldn't. Of all places....</p>

<p>It's easy to make fun of airport security, but don't forget Robert Reed nearly blew up a jetliner with a shoe bomb. Sounds like Maxwell Smart, but not really. And the 9/11 hijackers killed 3500 people armed only with a half-dozen box cutters. Who'd have thunk it?</p>

<p>I'd rather be safe than sorry. This girl clearly has NO common sense.</p>

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I'm not inferring malicious intent here. I am just dumbfounded by her behavior.

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<p>Right, and I was largely responding, with the bit that you quoted, to those who believe that she had malicious intent.</p>

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Ignorance of the law is no excuse.

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<p>This isn't ignorance of the law, it's ignorance of how the "average" person will think. Looking at the actual Massachusetts law, it doesn't look like she broke it, as the law requires intent.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.mass.gov/legis/laws/mgl/266-102a.5.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.mass.gov/legis/laws/mgl/266-102a.5.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>"Section 102A1/2. (a) Whoever possesses, transports, uses or places or causes another to knowingly or unknowingly possess, transport, use or place any hoax device or hoax substance with the intent to cause anxiety, unrest, fear or personal discomfort to any person or group of persons shall be punished by imprisonment in a house of correction for not more than two and one-half years or by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than five years or by a fine of not more than $5,000, or by both such fine and imprisonment."</p>

<p>Thank you Jessie, you found a good reference for the intent portion. Did anyone else notice that the AP article referred to "nine flashing lights" but did not include "in the shape of a 5-pointed star." Either airport officials are spinning their news to the press, or the press is spinning on their own. I vote that the airport officials are starting to feel a little silly and were controlling the news to make the event more ominous than it was.</p>

<p>I wonder what happens when a bunch of convention delegates try to go through an airport with the flashing-LED novelty badges that are frequent give-away trinkets?</p>

<p>EDITED: What she did was pretty dumb, but hardly criminal. This is a 19-year-old we are talking about here. That's a pretty clueless age, if my son and his friends are any indication.</p>

<p>EDITED 2: Was she shaping Play-Doh onto wires leading to the breadboard or not? This would certainly play to "intent."</p>

<p>jesse- not necessarily. Note from the statute: <knowingly or="" unknowingly="" possess="">. The whole argument centers around intent and state of mind. </knowingly></p>

<p>I'm not a lawyer but the statute is wide open for a great prosecutor or a lousy defense attorney to have a significant impact on her future. Let's hope it never gets that far.</p>

<p>If nothing else, it's in all probability a diversion in her life now. Detracts from her studies. Probably will cost her or her parents a few bucks in the process.</p>

<p>Maybe she'll realize her actions don't occur in a vacuum. Maybe she won't.</p>

<p>I've said my piece.</p>

<p>went to a fashion show and there were dresses with flashing lights, tshirts with moving logos, etc</p>

<p>and calling it a FAKE BOMB is lying, overkill and fear mongering to CTA (think CYA)</p>

<p>and that law sited is darn scary imo</p>

<p>as for safe than sorry stuff- i would rather be free to wear a stupid shirt and make comments in public than get hauled off by over zealous security</p>

<p>wait till it happens to your kid then maybe you won't be so gungho about rounding everybody up who isn't perfect</p>

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EDITED 2: Was she shaping Play-Doh onto wires leading to the breadboard or not? This would certainly play to "intent."

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<p>As far as I can tell, no. The only news source that I saw claim anything like this was the Herald, which is not known for, well, accuracy. The pictures don't show anything like that. It seems to be that she was playing with a piece of Play-Doh, but that the Play-Doh was not connected (or fake-connected) to the device.</p>

<p>Here's a link to the MIT student paper's coverage...</p>

<p><a href="http://www-tech.mit.edu/V127/N40/simpson.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www-tech.mit.edu/V127/N40/simpson.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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wait till it happens to your kid then maybe you won't be so gungho about rounding everybody up who isn't perfect

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<p>Wait until your daughter is blown up by a terrorist bomb and then maybe you won't mind the police being jumpy about apparent threats.</p>

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Why can't the average American - let alone the average security person - recognize an electronics breadboard?

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Why should this be part of the average American's knowledge base? Substitute ANY number of field specific tools for "electronics breadboard" and you can see how silly this question is. Would you recognize a rib spreader? It could be mistaken for a carpenter's tool or something your local auto mechanic would use. How about a laser distance measuring tool? It could appear to be a carpenter's tool, a cell phone, a garage door opener, a bomb detonator....</p>

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On a breadboard, sure, but a solderless protoboard that's not connected to anything but a battery...

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So Jessiel, what do you suggest? Who should be able to make a snap decision about whether the device was soldered? Or was connected to anything under her clothing? Hmmm....hold on here, missy. Where is that wire heading to KABOOM!!!!</p>

<p>I saw her hearing & she was wearing the oddest, most inappropriate grin. Very strange affect. She's a very creepy girl who behaved like an idiot & is lucky to be alive.</p>

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So Jessiel, what do you suggest? Who should be able to make a snap decision about whether the device was soldered?

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<p>Have you not read the multitude of other comments I've made on this thread? I've said several times that I don't expect them to realize at a glance that it's a harmless device, and that I don't think they were wrong to detain her. I just think that ONCE THEY'D ESTABLISHED THAT IT WAS HARMLESS, they should have let her go without charges.</p>

<p>What you bright kids (including mine) have to learn is you aren't dealing with yourselves, your dealing with other people. These other people aren't for the lack of a better term "in on the joke". That's where you can be so bright that you're dumb, because you fail to look around you and OBSERVE your surroundings. </p>

<p>I want to tell a story over 25 years old when I used to work for an ice cream company. I had a big delivery to a navy base commissary. Thousands of dollars of product. The Navy call sheet had two boxes for confirming delivery as NOTHING was allowed into the commissary that wasn't approved by command. One box was Vanilla and the other Assorted Flavors and you put the quanities in and they counted, you could not combine vanilla and assorted on the same pallet... Well, this one hot summer day, the chief is going through the count with me and he discovers "french vanilla" on the vanilla board. He stops and immediately demands to know "what is this?", It's french vanilla. "Show me where it is on the call sheet (the two boxes)?" I point at vanilla, he says firmly "NO, it isn't, it says "french" vanilla.". Then I said well, let put in under assorted flavors. "NO, because it "says" vanilla".
We went back and forth for 15 minutes, until I finally said look this stuff is melting and I've explained to you several times that french vanilla is vanilla with a bit more egg in it. You decide where you want to put it and I'll be fine.</p>

<p>"we'll leave it under vanilla". Great thanks...</p>

<p>What that story tells is you can't assume people in charge will understand something that you yourself so easily understand. In my world at the time, I knew french vanilla was vanilla, the person in "control" of the situation didn't and wasn't going to make a simple decision in a timely mannner. </p>

<p>In the future, I just hid the french vanilla inside the pallet of vanilla and didn't say a word.</p>

<p>washdad, your post is absurd, how is grabbing and threatening deadly force to some one wearing an OBVIOUSLLY fake whatever protecting my D?</p>

<p>my D carries playdo all the time, good stress reliver and fun when waiting for something to start and an easy way to get to talk to people- hey PLAYDO</p>

<p>she has extra batteries for her calculator, she has wires for her head set, she carries playdo, get her together with the guy next door who builds computers and is always got some sort of computer part on him and wham, you have materials for a BOMB</p>

<p>so many have bought into the fear culture it is astounding</p>

<p>what, my mom was going to tweeze someone to death?</p>

<p>what terrorist threat was there</p>

<p>look at the picture, it was comical </p>

<p>they determined right away it was nothing, but arrested her anyway- and yes they saw at a pretty quick glance, according to the articles that it was harmless</p>

<p>yeah, that makes me feel sooo much safer</p>

<p>Actually, Star Simpson is an extremely smart girl from an extremely sheltered world. She grew up on Maui (very small town, if you're not a tourist) and went to high school at a rural boarding school on the Big Island. She is used to a small world that knows her well; her admittance to MIT made Hawaii-wide news because she was already well-known for her academic excellence. Anywhere in Hawaii they would have asked questions first.... And apparently her first year at MIT (where she's a sophomore now) didn't give her a whole lot of street smarts... but I wouldn't have expected it to; it's a different kind of small world.</p>

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I just think that ONCE THEY'D ESTABLISHED THAT IT WAS HARMLESS, they should have let her go without charges.

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The very fact that she walked in Logan airport wearing something that could be INTERPRETED as a threat, and took up the time & attention of personnel at the airport, is deserving of a severe punishment. I'm thinking about those state troopers who had an extremely emoptional day. How would you feel if you had spent your afternoon pointing a machine gun at a teenager's head? Knowing that if she had moved an inch in the wrong direction, you may have shot her dead all because she was wearing a ridiculous, attention-getting blinking star on her sweatshirt? Imagine how high that ticket agent's blood pressure soared when that idiot walked up to her counter with the damn device blinking away.</p>

<p>So a 19 yr. old adult wearing a hoodie with wires, electronics, a battery and holding some sort of maliable clay in her hand is stopped at gunpoint at the airport then arrested and some of you have a problem with this? </p>

<p>As a nation we have charged airport security with the job of making us safe from terrorists (both homegrown and foreign). In todays world a cell phone, sneaker, lipgloss, etc. can be a bomb and some of you are screaming overkill ????? </p>

<p>She is lucky they didn't shoot her and I, for one, am surprised that they didn't.</p>

<p>"severe punishment" what the gulag? </p>

<p>blinking lights set people off? what? that my mom's tweezers required three marines with machine guns pointed at HER head...she is 5 feet tall one hundred pounds, and had tweezers</p>

<p>imagine being the teen who was almost killed because she was wearing what was so stupid looking</p>

<p>if those guards can't handle that kind of "stress" they shouldnt be there</p>

<p>severe punishment, what jail time for having people do their "jobs"</p>

<p>I have earrings that light up, st pats day pins that light up, and sometimes where necklaces that light up</p>

<p>I think everyone should go to logan with light up jewelry</p>

<p>as for taking up time, egad, that is their JOB to stand around all day watching and observing</p>

<p>severe punishment- tell me, what would you use as punishment?</p>

<p>lets see, jail time- using THOSE resources for someone like this while we have to let killers out because of space</p>

<p>yeah, that is a GOOD use of resources and attention</p>

<p>Yay, a chance for all of us to call a student at a top school dumb and naive.</p>

<p>Now, don't we all feel better about ourselves? I know my self-esteem is higher knowing that all these bright kids lack 'street smarts'.</p>

<p>On a more serious note, why did her 'nametag' have silly-putty on it?</p>

<p>so a cell phone can be a weapon, so if you use your cell phne in the wrong place, shoot you dead</p>

<p>got it</p>

<p>beware the killer lipgloss, guess we should all jsut fly naked, to make people like stickshock and conan feel safer</p>

<p>again, how you all live in such fear of life astounds me to no end</p>

<p>I once asked to sit near the front of a plane because we needed to get off FAST to catch our connecting fliight because our flight was 2 hours late</p>

<p>so they pulled our luggage, and everyhing...yeah me and my 3 and 1 yearold were dangerous</p>

<p>I feel like I am living in some fascist country where everyone is afraid of everything</p>

<p>BOOOOO</p>

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On a more serious note, why did her 'nametag' have silly-putty on it?

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<p>There was no putty on the tag. She was playing with Play-Doh when she asked the info desk when her boyfriend/labmate's flight was getting in. It wasn't attached to the device.</p>

<p>CGM, so you would have us believe that three marines pointed guns at your mother's head just because she carried tweezers on a plane? Yeah, right....</p>

<p>Law enforcement officers are not in the habit of shooting people for using cell phones. But here's a handy tip: If you are suspected of criminal activity or perhaps are being interrupted in the commission of a crime, and the cops say freeze & point a gun at you, that's not a wise time to answer your cell phone.</p>

<p>Yeah, I guess security should wait for the guy holding up the sign that says "I am a terrorist...and I have a bomb" before they go getting all uppity and in someones face.</p>