> They wanted to question him, probably in a private area.
That’s literally detaining him, so I am not sure what you’re objecting to here.
That’s literally detaining him, so I am not sure what you’re objecting to here.
If you have a flight to catch, of course, the calculus changes but once that becomes a lost cause, all bets are off.
If I miss my flight I'm more motivated to catch the next one, not test my available civil liberties in front of poorly-paid ex-military. Best case you end up detained (in the real sense) for a long time and potentially acquitted in court, months later and having incurred plenty of mental trauma. Worst case you just go to jail. Sounds like a lose-lose
Ha. Ha. Suddenly everyone's an expert in what constitutes detention. There's actually a big difference between "literally not detaining" someone and not detaining someone.
I think the detention naysayers in this thread have failed to consider that the people who practice this type of behavior are experts. Frequently the whole business of these interrogators is to make sure that someone is "not literally" detained, but that they are in fact detained, in the sense that they do not feel free to leave. In this way, the interrogator has not committed a crime or malfeasance by falsely detaining a person, but they isolate them and make them feel as though they need to answer questions.
The worst part is that there is almost no clear coaching for how a person is supposed to get through this type of situation. With the police, we can give clear advice: (1) ask "am I being detained or am I free to leave?" (2) Refuse to engage in conversation; (3) Ask for a lawyer. But these aren't police. They will tell you that you are not being detained. They have a few hundred dollars of your money and maybe a bunch of your clothes, and they just need you to answer a few questions before you get on the plane.
What are you going to say? "I refuse to answer questions without a lawyer"? "I refuse to remain in this tiny office answering questions"? Ok. Great. You're banned, and maybe turned over to TSA for a real custodial interrogation for acting so suspiciously at an airport.
Anyway, all this to say that your word games with "literally" this and that are not clever because this is actually much worse than a real custodial interrogation because the rights and obligations are much less clear and that lack of clarity accrues to the corporation's advantage.
In this case I would just declare that I'm leaving and if any resistance, demand the real cops be called or call them yourself. Same if they refuse to return your cash and/or luggage.
And the person in question is a teenager.
In a more well-adjusted society this would not be considered legal and people wouldn't be defending it.
Not true. Before you buy someone a skiplegged ticket you explain to them how this works. Why their ticket will say a different destination from where they want to go and why the airlines want to discourage the practice. Explain what things can go wrong (no checked-in luggage, things can go wrong with diversions).
If someone can’t understand the concept, or it confuses them, or they are too naive or too honest to play this “deception” or too busy to receive this information then just don’t and buy a regular ticket.
> What are you going to say?
Simple. They might ask you where you are traveling to. Answer “new york”. If they ask “but where are you really traveling?” answer “new york man, how many times you want to ask the same question?” if they ask you anything about New York answer whatever you want as long as the answer implies you are planing to go there.
On the other hand, I think a lot of the difficulty in situations like this comes from not knowing that this is about the "skiplag" issue (or not knowing if it's only about that issue). I think there's also a likely scenario where the airline starts investigating you for one thing and just sort of throws the book of accusations at you when they don't like how the skiplag interrogation is going.
My first comment was more about that: the private actor interrogating people without clear rules or limits.
That’s detainment by coercion at least.