Another Bad Screening Arrest

 Posted on July 17,2011 in Uncategorized

I get it: if you disrespect the TSA authoritah, you will get arrested.

Like this:

But now, a Colorado woman is accused of putting her hands on a TSA agent at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix.Court records show 61-year-old Yukari Mihamae grabbed the left breast of the female agent Thursday at the Terminal 4 checkpoint.Police say she squeezed and twisted the agent's breast with both hands.Officers say Mihamae admitted to the crime.There's no word why she touched the agent.

When I read a story like this, I like to read the applicable law. It's a little service I provide for my readers to try to distinguish myself from every other idiot commenting on the story. Here‘s the applicable law:

A person commits sexual abuse by intentionally or knowingly engaging in sexual contact with any person who is fifteen or more years of age without consent of that person or with any person who is under fifteen years of age if the sexual contact involves only the female breast.

"Squeezing and twisting someone's breast with both hands" is sexual contact, even if there is no intent to arouse or gratify anyone's sexual desire. But the lack of sexual intent is a defense (h/t Matt Brown, my go-to guy in Arizona):

It is a defense to a prosecution pursuant to section 13-1404 or 13-1410 that the defendant was not motivated by a sexual interest.

I don't know what motivated Ms. Mihamae, but "there's no word why she touched the agent," suggesting that when she "admitted to the crime" she didn't admit that she was motivated by a sexual interest.

If Ms. Mihamae was protesting rather than propositioning, she may have committed a misdemeanor assault-a class 1 misdemeanor (up to six months in jail), at the worst, if she caused physical injury.

If everyone you arrest hasn't committed the crime of which you've accused them, it will-I promise you-come back and bite you.