I accidentally left some throwing knives (I am a martial artist and have an interesting these types of things) in my backpack and ran into a similar situation. I was appalled when TSA found the knives, as this was just a few years after 9/11, and pretty earnest in my rapid apology. Well, unfortunately for me, not only was the TSA having a "bad day", but the police officer they called over was having a worse one.

I could waste a lot of space with details, ultimately he made threats my way and I responded poorly as I do not care much for authority of any kind. The end result was me spending thousands of dollars on a lawyer and travel fees only to have the judge immediately dismiss the case when it went to court, as the whole situation was ludicrous when looked at from the outside. It seriously hurt my finances to defend myself, I was no architect and I was pretty much outraged over the entire ordeal.

My point is these TSA / LE type positions know they can wreck your world with essentially the wave of a wand. Stories like this poor guy sicken me. I would personally like to see private agencies running the show again, the TSA has too much power and situations like mine and this poor guy are really just inexcusable.