ESSERMAN

PROVIDENCE — A week ago yesterday, Police Chief Dean M. Esserman was about to fly to Savannah, Ga., to lecture about leadership and community policing.

He said he did what he always does. He telephoned the police station at T.F. Green Airport to say he was coming, that he would be expecting an escort.

In other words, law enforcement courtesy. He would be escorted by an airport police officer and save time by not having to wait in a line of passengers at the Transportation Security Administration checkpoint.

Esserman got his escort. And by his own account as well as that of a TSA spokeswoman, he was initially allowed to walk around the metal detector and personal-search process, to avoid having to take off his shoes and belt and empty his pockets, and go straight to his departure gate.

The chief flew out that day and gave his paid lecture. But now he finds himself under an investigation by the TSA and the airport police, possibly subject to a potential fine for a civil violation for having circumvented airport security.

According to both accounts, Esserman was called back to the metal detector before his flight. And he did have to submit to screening.

“The chief was not exempt from screening,” TSA spokeswoman Ann Davis said yesterday. “Like all passengers he needed to go through the passenger security checkpoint to undergo screening before proceeding to his gate.”

Said state police Deputy Supt. Steven G. O’Donnell, “There’s no such thing as law enforcement courtesy at an airport. Everybody has the same rules going through” screening. Under a reorganization of state government, the airport police are now supervised by the state police and a trooper lieutenant is the acting chief of the airport police.

Davis and O’Donnell said the incident is under investigation, including the actions of Esserman and the airport police. And Davis said that while the intent of an alleged violator is a factor, the chief could be held liable and given a civil fine.

“One could get the impression that I was sneaking through a side door…,” Esserman said yesterday. “But as you can see, that was not quite the case.”

“They made a mistake,” he said of the airport police, by having him skirt the metal detector lanes. As best he can remember, when he has been escorted in the past, he has bypassed the line of passengers but still gone through the metal detector and personal-search process, he said.

“I know some law enforcement officials who have been offered the courtesy [of avoiding checkpoint lines] directly by TSA security and others directly by the airport police,” he added.

Federal air marshals and high-ranking government officials with a security detail, such as a governor of a state, are among the few individuals who are exempt from routine screening, according to Davis. Law enforcement officers carrying weapons are subject to a separate screening process, according to Esserman, Davis and O’Donnell. But Esserman said he does not bring his sidearm when he travels.

As the chief went to his gate, Davis said, federal transportation security officers followed and called a superior.

As Esserman tells it, he was walked around the metal detectors by an airport police officer and that after he had sat down at the gate, a higher-ranking airport police lieutenant approached him, asked if he was armed, apologized, and said he would have to come back and be screened.

Just as he had gotten up, he said, a TSA security manager wearing a blazer approached and said he would have to come back.

“I picked up my bagel and my copy of The Providence Journal and I walked back to the checkpoint,” Esserman said.

Said Davis, “He cooperated and did return to the checkpoint.”

“We are in the process of gathering statements from various people to assess what transpired and make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Davis said.

Esserman complimented the airport police for their professionalism and politeness.

gsmith@projo.com