Eyewitness: " I NEVER heard the word BOMB"

From the OOOH SHIT File:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1138965,00.html

A passenger on Flight 924 gives his account of the shooting and says Rigoberto Alpizar never claimed to have a bomb
By SIOBHAN MORRISSEY/MIAMI
Posted Thursday, Dec. 08, 2005

At least one passenger aboard American Airlines Flight 924 maintains the federal air marshals were a little too quick on the draw when they shot and killed Rigoberto Alpizar as he frantically attempted to run off the airplane shortly before take-off.

"I don't think they needed to use deadly force with the guy," says John McAlhany, a 44-year-old construction worker from Sebastian, Fla. "He was getting off the plane." McAlhany also maintains that Alpizar never mentioned having a bomb.

"I never heard the word 'bomb' on the plane," McAlhany told TIME in a telephone interview. "I never heard the word bomb until the FBI asked me did you hear the word bomb. That is ridiculous." Even the authorities didn't come out and say bomb, McAlhany says. "They asked, 'Did you hear anything about the b-word?'" he says. "That's what they called it."

When the incident began McAlhany was in seat 24C, in the middle of the plane. " was in the back," McAlhany says, "a few seats from the back bathroom. He sat down." Then, McAlhany says, "I heard an argument with his wife. He was saying 'I have to get off the plane.' She said, 'Calm down.'"

Alpizar took off running down the aisle, with his wife close behind him. "She was running behind him saying, 'He's sick. He's sick. He's ill. He's got a disorder," McAlhany recalls. "I don't know if she said bipolar disorder . She was trying to explain to the marshals that he was ill. He just wanted to get off the plane."

McAlhany described Alpizar as carrying a big backpack and wearing a fanny pack in front. He says it would have been impossible for Alpizar to lie flat on the floor of the plane, as marshals ordered him to do, with the fanny pack on. "You can't get on the ground with a fanny pack," he says. "You have to move it to the side."

By the time Alpizar made it to the front of the airplane, the crew had ordered the rest of the passengers to get down between the seats. "I didn't see him get shot," he says. "They kept telling me to get down. I heard about five shots."

McAlhany says he tried to see what was happening just in case he needed to take evasive action. "I wanted to make sure if anything was coming toward me and they were killing passengers I would have a chance to break somebody's neck," he says. "I was looking through the seats because I wanted to see what was coming.

"I was on the phone with my brother. Somebody came down the aisle and put a shotgun to the back of my head and said put your hands on the seat in front of you. I got my cell phone karate chopped out of my hand. Then I realized it was an official."

In the ensuing events, many of the passengers began crying in fear, he recalls. "They were pointing the guns directly at us instead of pointing them to the ground," he says "One little girl was crying. There was a lady crying all the way to the hotel."

McAlhany said he saw Alpizar before the flight and is absolutely stunned by what unfolded on the airplane. He says he saw Alpizar eating a sandwich in the boarding area before getting on the plane. He looked normal at that time, McAlhany says. He thinks the whole thing was a mistake: "I don't believe he should be dead right now."

---------------------------------------------

I don't know about YOU, but *I* am NOT flying any more so long as this is how these Nazi Police State NWO trolls do shit...sick...

...one sitting 20-some rows back.

I'm waiting to hear reports from people in the front of the plane who actually had a chance of hearing something before I nail the FAMs to crosses.

failure to get the guy some water. :)

The bastards!



:hi: from the other thread!

marshall's statement:


"Investigators are trying to piece together the final moments before the shooting as questions are rising about whether Alpizar made a bomb threat.

The marshals say Alpizar announced he was carrying a bomb before being killed.

However, no other witness has publicly concurred with that account. Only one passenger recalled Alpizar saying, "I've got to get off, I've got to get off," CNN's Kathleen Koch reported."

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/12/08/airplane.gunshot/index.html

One statement has been published so far.

That one witness didn't hear the word "bomb".

Therefore, NO witnesses have reported hearing the word "bomb".




I'm sure they'll be more statements available over the next few days...I'll wait for those. I've already heard what this one witness has to say.

marshall's contention, they would have spoken up by now. In the article I posted the link to, CNN quotes at least three other passengers commenting on the incident:

"She was just saying her husband was sick, her husband was sick," said passenger Alan Tirpak. When the woman returned, "she just kept saying the same thing over and over, and that's when we heard the shots."

Tirpak said he didn't hear Alpizar say anything."

Another passenger, Mary Gardner of Orlando, said she also overheard Buechner. "I heard her say, 'He's bipolar. He doesn't have his medicine,'" Gardner recalled. ( Watch passenger's account: 'Something going on wasn't right' -- 3:21)

Gardner said that the couple had quarreled before the shooting.

Ellen Sutliff, who said she sat near Alpizar on the flight into Miami from Quito, Ecuador, described him as agitated even then. His wife kept coaxing him, saying, " 'We just have to get through customs. Please, please help me get through this,' " according to Sutliff.

" 'We're going to be home soon, and everything will be all right,' " Sutliff quoted the wife as saying."

One would think that if these passengers could confirm the marshall's contention, they would have during their interview.

I'd need to see the testimony of a first-class passenger to consider it pertinent.

could have seen or heard the man, from your perspective. It is odd that none of the first class passengers have come forward to confirm the marshall's story, one must wonder why?

reports from the back of the plane...it has nothing to do with "first class passengers".

'class', it was using your criteria from the previous post. One can hear shouting in first class, babies crying, etc, even when not seated there but,based on your criteria, only the testimony from first class passengers will be credible. If a first class passenger does not come forward to affirm the marshal's contention but a passenger from the middle of the plane does, will the passenger from the middle of the plane not have credibility with you?

NO first class passenger has come forward to affirm the marshal's contention that the man yelled he had a bomb, one has to wonder why?

the press will be pursuing statements.

n/t

sitting in the middle of the plane didn't hear? All I'm suggesting is that somebody sitting close to the Air Marshals would be a much more relieble witness. What's your issue with that?

was also seated in first class, the witness reports and news reports state that he ran up the aisle followed by his wife and followed by the man in the Hawaiian shirt, who turned out to be one of the air marshalls. So on what do you base your "belief" that the air marshalls were seated in first class?

http://www.wftv.com/news/5503137/detail.html

The Winter Park architect, whose profession requires attention to detail, doesn't like how some have taken liberty with what really happened on board Flight 924.

"I want the truth to be known and it frustrates me to read that he was running down the plane, flailing and screaming that he had a bomb. That is not the case," he said.

Instead, he saw a hurried Alpizar, followed by his wife shouting he was bi-polar in an apologetic tone. When she turned back for the luggage, Borelli heard gunshots in the jetway.


NEXT!

I'm trying to reserve judgment of the federal officials until more is conclusively known, but this really doesn't look good.

Both McAlhany's and this other guy's short interviews came out yesterday, which is why alot of us had started leaning towards disbelief of the bomb-threatening Alzipar story yesterday. McAlhany's observations pretty clearly prove that Alzipar wasn't running down the aisle hysterically telling people he had a bomb, as we've been barraged with by FAM defenders for the first two days. But we've nonetheless been waiting for first-class passenger accounts of what happened in the front of the plane because, unlike so many people who, on almost no evidence, have concluded fully that the Marshals acted appropriately, did what they were supposed to do, had no other choice, etc etc etc, we're just not that willingly subservient to authoritarian predisposition. It has been kind of a revelation for me just how many DU'ers are so immediately comfortable in that position.

I saw this second guy, grey-haired and in his fifties it looked like, twice. He simply said that Alzipar looked agitated and wanted to get off the plane. He didn't appear to have been threatened or worried or in any way startled by Alzipar's attempt to get off the plane. Alzipar was just an agitated guy wanting to disembark. And this guy didn't mention anything about a bomb. He wasn't asked specifically that, but without question the mention of a bomb by Alzipar would have come up if he had heard it.

So what we have now is, completely contrary to all 'reports' of crazy Alpizar yelling bomb as he runs down the aisle, that nothing was said to the passengers about a bomb at all. That leaves the following possibilities open:

1) someone else in first-class even closer than this guy might have heard Rigo quietly say bomb
2) Rigo might have quietly said something about a bomb to the AM's at the exit
3) Rigo might have said "bomb" in the jetway after he had exited the plane when the Marshals followed him

But there's another problem here too. The Air Marshal Service isn't saying Alpizar said "bomb". He said "one sentence" which made the Marshals think there might be a bomb.

So, for all intents and purposes, from everything we know so far, the current conclusion has to be that the whole Rigoberto running up the aisle yelling or telling "bomb" to the passengers is a complete and utter pile of bullshit. And we proceed from there. Except that we now have an entire news-viewing population, including many here on DU, filled with the sense of brave federal Marshals with no other recourse than to gun down a crazy bomb-screaming man for the safety of a plane-load of people.

To my mind, with the evidence we have at this point, we have a couple of AM's too quick to use lethal force against an agitated guy who wouldn't put his bag down in a jetway. And even that is open for question. I wouldn't be surprised if Rigo was trying to unhook that bag from his waist when they opened up on him.

I wonder if pointing guns at innocent passengers is in the air marshal procedure book?

Actual hijackers tend not to work alone, and the problem for anyone trying to thwart a hijacking of some sort is knowing who can and cannot be trusted on the plane. It's the same principle as the one at work when law enforcement evacuates hostages on the ground. Even the hostages are suspect and kept under control until law enforcement can positively identify them.

I'm not defending the overall action here, but that part of it wasn't all that surprising to me.

As for the main point here, this whole thing has smelled like rancid trash from the beginning, and it just gets worse.

this should be posted all over the net. I nominate it.

this is, if confirmed, the "London shooting" nr 2

Talk about THUGS. I mean, what the HELL does this guy being on his phone have to do with the other guy who's supposed to have a bomb?! It's called we'll bully your asses and you'll like it. How sad. Not my America.

phones do set off bombs you know... but you're right about thugs, why not go CSI-like and just say,"Sir, say goodbye to your friend and put down that telephone". TV nice is better sometimes, but i guess life ain't TV.

the word wasn't said.

How many other people were on the plane? Quite a few I think.

if you play up EXPECTATIONS people can lie to themselves and think things that did not occur.. Very few people have a mind to go against authority and expectations of others. Remember the stanford experiment?
Eyewitness testimony in mass is not always accurate Remember The Presidio Child abuse scandal? The victims years later recanting it all even though they knew they lied at the time kept on lying to please authority figures,and meet expectations, people still today insist presidio is real despite overwhelming evidence of public hysteria that presidio was fake?
How do you think that happens.Because engineered expectations by authority figures can fool masses out of having an accurate recall of actual events.

:eyes:

I think US travelers are well aware that their flights could be hijacked, but before, it was a matter of "we all know we'll just be taken hostage." Now we know they have no compunction about killing themselves and everyone on board.

Regardness of :tinfoilhat:who was actually at fault:tinfoilhat:, one consequence of the 9/11 attacks is that there is a segment of air travelers who are willing to risk their lives to try to eliminate the hijackers, even if they themselves are unarmed. Maybe it was only after-the-fact bravado on the part of the person quoted, but I'll wager there are more people willing the tkae a "chance to break their necks" than there are hijackers' necks awaiting breaking.

This is the same reason we have a Second Amendment: power in numbers. That alone makes me safer while flying (not that I will for a long while after reading about this incident).

As an aside, how do we convince our government we feel that way? How do we go about telling them, "we're not afraid any more"?

The MEDIA started using it based on statements from AMS officials. Here's the head AMS official (Bauer) in Miami and his statement on pbs:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/terrorism/july-dec05/miami_12-7.html

JAMES BAUER: At approximately 2:10 this afternoon, American Airlines Flight 924 was boarding at Gate D.-42 -- it was in the boarding process. An individual later tentatively identified as Rigoberto Alpizar, age 44, was boarding that aircraft as well.

At some point, he uttered threatening words that included a sense that, in fact, that he had a bomb. There were federal air marshals on board the aircraft. They came out of their cover, confronted him, and he remained noncompliant with their instructions.

As he was attempting to evade them, his actions caused the FAM's to fire shots and, in fact, he is deceased.

The Miami-Dade Police Department responded to this event and in fact are conducting the shooting investigation.

The FBI also responded to this, and a crime was committed aboard an American carrier aircraft and they have jurisdiction in that matter, and to see whether or not there's a nexus to terrorism.

And some people will not be satisfied that the word wasn't used until every single passenger and crewmember signs an affidavit asserting such. Of those, some will not have been directly present and will be triumphantly depicted by the Defenders of Authority as examples of shining truth.

:evilgrin:

She didn't hear anything about a bomb either. So there's two. How many do you need before you get it? The guy was gunned down.

the gays,the non christians.. all so the white bread rich soccer moms and nascar dads feel safe.

Normal is the invention of Nazis. First torture than Eugenics.
Take away a womans right to abortion without interference from mate or state,. than you allow the government to regulate who breeds and who dies.Stupid fucking fundies NEVER THINK of the other implications in how their pathetic religiously driven support of a rouge regime is used beyond their own myopic self serving agenda.The Government will throwaway the rightwingnuts when they have sufficiently created their fascist wet dream under the facade of democracy and convinced the American people it's all good.
Damn. I do not trust the "powers" that be to know how to be fair, sane or have regard for human lives..anymore.

uttered?

I'm confused. :shrug:

Since there's only one statement so far and HE didn't hear it, there are "no reports" of witnesses hearing it.

have said they didn't hear the man say anything about a bomb and the other two don't reference the issue of the bomb at all.

Are Due On Maple Street." Twilight Zone? Considering the number we are doing on ourselves any real terrorists might as well chill out at Club Med.

this could have all gone so wrong and out of control if people had, you know, gone crazy or something.

As long as the number that are safe and secure outnumber the bodies in aisle and jet ramp, then Duhbya's a hero. :eyes: :eyes: :eyes:

Digby has an interesting point at his blog: The Marshals (who have a tough job, no doubt about it, wouldn't want it, couldn't make me take it) apparently automatically assumed that the guy had a bomb. That is, after all the security checkpoints, the metal detectors, the wands, the searches, the x-ray machines, the dogs, and everything else, the Marshals figured that it was quite possible that someone had gotten on board with a bomb. And their behavior afterward (drawing down on passengers, knocking cell phones out of people's hands, etc.) indicates that the Marshals have a real high opinion of all that folderol we all go through to get on a plane.

No matter how cynical or skeptical I am regarding the insanely ridiculous kabuki of the (so-called) TSA, and it's primary goal of creating profits where none existed before, I have to believe the already-low probability of a bomb on-board a plane is made far lower.

There's something HUGELY dissonent about Air Marshals having such low confidence in the 'system' that they behave like they're totally ruled by fear and loathing. The passenger is the enemy! The public is the enemy! I wonder if paranoia and animosity towards 'civilians' are hiring criteria? Are these people whose psch profiles disqualify them for regular police work?

The constant drumbeat of fear and loathing that has gone on 24x7 for the last four years has seeped into our very psyches. Otherwise (assumedly) sane and rational people advocate the "shoot first and ask questions later" maxim, eagerly blaming the victims of our societal neuroses - swallowing the thinnest fables and fictions to shore up a morally bankrupt 'case.'

Appallingly absent in DU's discourse after the plain fact, gleaned from 20-40 hindsight, that the poor victim was no threat whatsoever is any rational analysis of how to prevent this kind of 'mistake' in the future. This is acceptable? This is OK? Not in any world I wish to live in.


"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" is truer today than ever. How did we get so fucking stupid?

in the name of terra.....

until the truth came out........huge silence.......

Nice to know which DU'ers are actually Liberals and which ones just act like it though.

They deny how happy and relieved they are over an innocent mans death, yet they defend these guys and continue to espouse half truths that have already been debunked. It is now well more than one witness. The FAMs let him get away (major MAJOR fuck up), he got away and so they shot him even though the wife was screaming about his illness, even though they had him cornered and were talking with him in 1st class. I dont see how these LE apologists can actually think that teh FAMs are fucking heros when they made these mistakes.

I also cant believe how ok people are with it. How much they apparently despise people with mental illness, Im telling you the offensive wording Ive seen used for this mans disabilities. Well at least my eyes are open now. I'll be putting them all on ignore and if that doesn't work Im leaving DU for good maybe the party. I see very little differennce here between freeper reactions and some DU'ers (am dIm not saying the DUers are freeps, Im saying that they are behaving in a similar matter).

Im shaking with anger... I think I need to break away for a day or two.

who said something to the effect that it seemed fairly obvious to her that the man was panicking and did not seem like a threat.


Sometimes I wonder if the HS agents started rounding up dissenters, if some of these people wouldn't jump to defend it.

the insanity that goes on here. you'll feel much better and will be better able to accept the stark realization that liberalism is a very narrow path for some people. but i believe (maybe, hope is more like it) that they are just the minority. have a nice holiday season. see you when you get back. :)

time. I'm glad I did.

I am going to put my head in the sand as the whole world is crazy with guns so people are going to be shot by one of these nuts. It is just to sad. I guess one just has to find some reason to use a gun if you have it with you.

that the man never did have a bomb, and in fact, never even said he did...

The whole thing just triggered red flags for me as soon as the story broke.

Hopefully more and more will finally learned to QUESTION ATHORITY!

I wish some of the true believers in authority would just ask themselves "when have they ever actually found a bomb?". This shoot to kill policy is just wrong and it works simply from the fear vantage point that we as liberals decry every day. There are better ways to handle security.

I dont like the sound of that. Not good to just trust one passenger report, but it does raise many questions and concerns. A definite reason to look much deeper into this. He really shouldnt have been killed. Maim if you must, but come on.

Day crew, care to flame me some more!

"I don't know about YOU, but *I* am NOT flying any more so long as this is how these Nazi Police State NWO trolls do shit...sick..."

Shoot first ask questions later must have been taught the first day of training.

This tragedy brought out some posters true colors. Some real sickos - sad.