Recently one of our colleagues from an Asian country had a very unfortunate incident while traveling through Chicago. I've probably kept much of the information very generic to protect my innocent colleague.
He was on his way to an OPC meeting, and while coming from Asia he had to travel through Chicago. As he was going through security, he did all the right things of unpacking his belongings and emptying his pockets into the bin to go through the security screening. Unfortunately, a woman who was behind him took the opportunity to snatch his wallet from the bin as he went forward through security.
He detected that his wallet was missing, and out of the corner of his eye he realized the lady who was behind him would've been the only person that could've snatched his wallet so easily. She went around him after going through security she promptly tried to depart the security area. He reached for her and grabbed her in an attempt to restrain her and stop her from departing security with his wallet. Unfortunately, security reacted and ended up arresting my colleague for accosting the lady. Of course the language barrier also was not in his favor, and he was basically being accused of grabbing the lady independent of the fact that she was getting away with stealing his wallet.
Security let the lady leave the security area, and essentially my colleague was arrested. Security never bothered to listen to my colleague before the lady left the area to see if she was taking his wallet.
Long story short, the lady later came back to security as a witness to my colleague attacking her. Of course now the wallet has been disposed of and the content is provided to someone else.
It seems an arrest in that my colleague who now own did not have a wallet was about to be arrested and charged for trying to stop a person from taking his wallet.
The lesson learned here is take all of your contents out of your pockets that is absolutely necessary in order to go through the security screening, and make sure you put your contents inside of your appropriate bag long before you get to the security area. It is your job to make it extremely difficult for anyone to steal your belongings as you parade through the security.
My colleague is now forced to get an attorney to defend himself and the complications of living abroad will be a nightmare over the next several months as he pleads his innocence in this unfortunate incident.
Thoughts?