Disabled Girl ‘Traumatized’ By TSA After Being Detained for ‘Bomb Residue’

The 12-year-old girl left in tears after TSA agents detained her for nearly an hour at a Texas airport because they claimed to have found traces of bomb residue on her hands has revealed she is still ‘traumatized’ by the incident a week later.

Wheelchair-bound Shelbi Walser was traveling to Florida with her mother, Tammy Daniels, for treatment for her brittle bone disorder on December 8 when she was stopped at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport in Texas.

Shelbi Walser says she is still in shock by the event that caused a public outcry when video footage emerged showing Shelbi sobbing as officials detained her in front of hundreds of travelers at security, but refuse to allow her mother to get close enough to comfort her.

‘I didn’t know what was going to happen and what they were going to do to me. [I thought they might] take me away,’ she told RadarOnline.com.

The little girl makes the trip at least twice a year to receive treatment for brittle bone disease, which has left her wheelchair-bound. Her mom revealed that during the ordeal Shelbi told her that she didn’t want to go to Florida and that she wanted to go home. Shelbi said the unpleasant incident meant she would be more nervous in future and she would be washing her hands before going through security for fear that she might test positive again.

A TSA agent swabbed Shelbi’s hands and she tested positive for explosives. But the wheelchair, which is likely to have transferred any substance to her hands as she pushed it, was never tested, her mother said. Rather than ‘explosive residue’, her mom believes it was probably fertilizer they detected on Shelbi’s hands. The family live in the country and Daniels believes it could have transferred to her daughter’s hands via her wheels.

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