Immigration officer put wife on no-fly list

An immigration officer in the U.K. found a novel way to end his relationship with his wife. His cunning plan was to wait until she went abroad to visit family, then add her to name to the terrorist no-fly list. Unable to return from Pakistan for three years, with officials refusing to tell her why, it took three years for the truth to emerge According to the Daily Mail, his act was only discovered during a background check required for a promotion. He got fired. Furthermore, his wife is now able to return home. Immigration officer fired after putting wife on list of terrorists to stop her flying home [Daily Mail]

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Anonymous

Of course no one will ever abuse the system…
whoops.
Jake0748

Christ, what an asshole.
Didn’t he get anything besides being fired?
lastonk

Fired. Just fired?

With a premeditated act, this person abused his power to cause another human being three years of anguish!

Either put this man in jail… or at the very least, add him to the no fly zone as the husband to someone once on the list.
- OrcOnTheEndOfMyFork
  
  Fired. Just fired?
  
  Assuming this story is even true to begin with, I’m pretty sure once she gets home, being fired will be the least of his worries…
  - Ugly Canuck
    
    You may be right.
    Here’s a song about a similar but lesser (perhaps) situation:
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0iA_rOcn9Y
voivoed

There’s NO WAY people would use these no-supervision/no-due-process/no-appeal mechanisms for their own gain!
insert

Let’s all make it completely clear to our governments: No-fly lists won’t fly. (Sorry…)

I hope the UK equivalent of the ACLU uses this to destroy these idiotic and abusive due-process-free bullshit laws. Gah.
Rob

Although I have problems believing something like this could happen, I do have problems believing it did. Any primary source that *isn’t* a tabloid?
- takeshi
  
  Even if it is from a tabloid, you do realize that ‘The National Enquirer’ breaks more news stories every year than just about anyone else in the business?
  
  If true, this guy should go to jail, and she should sue his ass for everything he’s got.
  - ahankinson
    
    If you throw enough shit at the wall, something’s bound to stick. :)
GermiaJohnson

Jeez, I hope his wife takes him to the cleaners in the divorce, then sues him for the whole “being trapped in pakistan” part and takes the rest.
Anonymous

This should be treated as a federal offense.
Ministry

I’ll consider believing it when a news source runs the story.

It’s your blog, Rob, but I really wish you wouldn’t bother reposting anything – at all – from negative-credibility sources like the Mail.
- imag
  
  +1.
Anonymous

I think the real question here is who gets the wagon-wheel coffee table in the divorce?
Anonymous

Take my wife, please
Antinous / Moderator

I propose putting him on the no-fly list. In mid-air.
- morcheeba
  
  I totally read that in Ah-nold’s voice.
  - The Mudshark
    
    That makes it so much more awesome.
Antinous / Moderator

Similarly: A Hemet couple pleaded guilty Tuesday to felony charges that the husband impersonated a federal official to try to deport a woman.
the spacebase

I have to give the guy credit for being clever. Awful, horrible, but clever.
Anonymous

He should get three years in jail.

also…CLEVER? How how could it be any LESS clever?

It’s like saying a butcher is clever for chopping his wife into little pieces. Gosh how did he ever think of it?
- the spacebase
  
  Alright, not sure I can respond to an anon, but no, it’s not the most clever thing I’ve ever heard, but dude was clearly unwilling to get a divorce, and this was certainly a better option than murder. Took care of his problem, if illegally and temporarily, and using a system that – he thought – was so seemingly random that he would just get away with it.
  
  Still, she should have sailed back and kicked his ass.
jfrancis

No Woman No Fly

:D
- wood29
  
  I’m putting you on my “terrible persons” list.
- Pantograph
  
  You should be ashamed of yourself for posting that, and I should be ashamed of myself for laughing out loud.
Daemon

I’m just surprised they took her name off the list.
Anonymous

His wife is now able to return? Oh cool.
…Wait WHAT? …his…WIFE?
She’s STILL his wife!?!?
AlisBinks

Wow…. Just, wow.
That’s all I’ve got.
Flashman

A man after my own heart
angryearthling

what’s most worrying is that there was no safety check to see who was adding information to the list and for what cause. a database is only as good as the dumbest/crookedest user who has access.

that there was no second line double checking the names and removing those that were added incorrectly.

is this nofly list merged with the us verison? is there a separate us version?

so anybody can be added if they annoy the wrong person?
peterbruells

yes, outrageous, but why didn’t she take the train?
- Anonymous
  
  Wait… take a train back to the UK… from Pakistan? Am I missing something here?
  - peterbruells
    
    Unless there are no trains in Pakistan, sure.
    
    It takes 58 hours from London to Istanbul Sirkeci by train and I’m quite sure that one get from there to Pakistan in a similar manner.
    
    It takes 200 hours from from London to Wladiwostok, changing trains three times.
    
    I really don’t see why it would take three years unless some very debilitating disease is involved.
    - dainel
      
      Fly to Paris or Amsterdam. *THEN* take the train.
      - peterbruells
        
        I was sketching the worst case rrrrrrrrrrrrrscenarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
    - AlexG55
      
      It’s very slow, and there may be gaps (which require a bus or taxi) between Bam, Iran and Quetta, Pakistan. The other issue, of course, is that it requires an Iranian visa!
      
      Not everyone is as adventurous as your average happy mutant, and I think most mutants would balk at a 34-hour ride on a non-air-conditioned train car through the desert of SE Iran…
Anonymous

Do you think this would work for Lawyers or better yet politicians?
Kerov

The outrage is that the US and UK have each created systems of secret extrajudicial travel bans that are, by their very natures, so completely ripe for abuse.

It’s hard to believe that, in these 21st century advanced democracies, there is no popular outcry against the existence of routinized processes for banishing citizens without due process.
andigopow

How do I know which Daily Mail stories to believe?!
bobthecitizen

YAY, the system works, no… wait… the other thing. The system is a resounding failure.

I have a gay relative who has been on and off the list because in much of the middle east being gay and politically active is lumped with terrorism, and we have agreements that we automatically regard their “terrorists” as our “terrorists”. it takes about 3 weeks to clear it up each time, but so far this has ruined 3 family vacations.

She is from the US and has never even gone to the middle east, nor been politically active abroad.
Hanglyman

So what did they do to compensate the woman for those three years, and what did they do to ensure that something like this could never happen to anyone else in the future? I’m guessing absolutely nothing.
Anonymous

what a effin moron! he should be banned from flying at all.
Miss Cellania

I rejected the story because it was in The Mirror and there were no names. Now it’s in the Daily Mail, still no names. Next -The Sun?
abulafia

OK Boingers, here’s a rule of thumb when it comes to stories from the Daily Mail; If it’s in the Daily Mail it’s probably racist (bloody immigrants) classist (benefit cheats!) or just plain wrong because their reporters are too lazy to check facts (anything that wouldn’t normally fit into the two previous categories).

Target audience is retired middle classes who shout at the TV.
- Anonymous
  
  I am not quite yet retired, am middle class and I do shout at the TV. But I won’t allow the Mail in the house. Maybe I’m shouting at different TV to the Mail readers.
- knoxblox
  
  Hey, I shout at the TV, and don’t even watch Fox except maybe a new episode of COPS now and then. There’s just something riveting about seeing naked people getting tased, or trying to drive on just the rims of their wheels.
  
  Of course, one tries to warn them, but they never listen.
  
  I always thought the content was better suited for the National Geographic channel anyway.
  - Ugly Canuck
    
    “There’s just something riveting about seeing naked people getting tased…”
    
    What do we have for entertainment
    Cops kicking Gypsies on the pavement
    
    Oh wait maybe you’d like to sing along:
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcHL8efKKPE
    
    hey now it’s the news
    snap to attention
    - knoxblox
      
      To be fair, I yell at the screen during Godard films, too.
abulafia

Oh, and here is a site that regularly rips their fabrications to pieces. Hilarious, if worrying reading:
http://www.mailwatch.co.uk/
Anonymous

peterbruells, did you ever stop to think about what happens to a person on a no-fly list when they try to get on an airplane?

If this story is true, there’s a very good chance she spent a part of the 3 years in a Pakistani prison. If it had been me, I’d stay away from all forms of transportation after that. Even if they didn’t arrest and imprison her, the fact that they weren’t allowed to tell her *why* she couldn’t board would probably have confused the heck out of her. They may have told her she wasn’t allowed out of Pakistan. Who knows what they said?

The fact that the tabloid doesn’t mention what happened to her in the intervening 3 years makes me think the story might not be genuine. Although it’s common for British tabloids to ignore most of what happens in Pakistan, so who knows.
DreadPirateRoberts

Another good rule of thumb is: if it is in the Daily Mail and appears nowhere else then it is almost certainly untrue or so distorted that the original story is unrecognisable.
A quick trawl of Google only brings up re-posts of the Mail article. Not even the other tabloids have picked this ine up, and the officer never even gets a namecheck.
There is probably a grain of truth here, but more nuanced and less “funny” than the Mail is willing to countenance.
DreadPirateRoberts

Here is another sobering link for anybody still thinking of accepting this story at face value

http://nosleeptilbrooklands.blogspot.com/2011/01/true-story-of-daily-mail-lies-guest.html
iguanoid

holy crap that dude did not like that lady