Bloodied and bruised Hannah Cohen was led from Memphis International Airport in handcuffs.
(WREG)- The 19-year old was headed home to Chattanooga after treatment for a brain tumor at St. Jude Hospital. It’s a trip they’ve made for 17-years.
This time, an unarmed Hannah, set off the metal detector at a security checkpoint. “They wanted to do further scanning, she was reluctant, she didn’t understand what they were about to do,” said her mother Shirley Cohen.
Cohen told us she tried to tell TSA agents her daughter is partially deaf, blind in one eye, paralyzed, and easily confused, but said she was kept at a distance by police.
“She’s trying to get away from them but in the next instant, one of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere,” said Cohen.
Hannah was arrested, booked and on the night she should have been celebrating the end of her treatment, she was locked up in Jail East.
Authorities later threw out the charges but the family filed a lawsuit against the Memphis Airport, Airport Police, and the Transportation Security Administration.
*ADDENDUM: According to sources, the assault on the girl was inflicted by airport police and not the TSA agents. This is unverified, only word of mouth from one source.