No longer free to move about the country
Wash. runaway, 9, sneaks onto 2 flights before getting caught in Texas

Jan 17, 2007

LAKEWOOD, Wash. - A 9-year-old boy who didn't like his suburban Tacoma home grabbed a car, got caught, was returned home to his mother, then ran away again and flew to San Antonio with a plane change in Phoenix before he was arrested, authorities said.

Investigators and Southwest Airlines officials were trying to determine how Semaj Booker, who was trying to get to his grandfather in Texas, made his way through security and onto the airplane.


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Somethings definitely wrong here. I just have to wonder how bad something has to be for him to risk this over and over. Especially only being 9 years old. That's a freaking baby.

i noticed it said that child services has visited the house at the request of the mother and that she told the police to not bring him home the last time...just sounds like she's trying to get rid of him to me.

(And yes, I can already hear the chorus about how he's a brat and all that, but I have to wonder what the cause of the behavior is.)

Lefty- you're right- usually goes right back to the parents!

This indicates two things to me. Lefty nailed one of them. This boy is running away from something so horrendous that he's willing to risk all kinds of dangers to get away from it.

The other thing this report exposes is how ineffective airport security really is in this country. If a nine year old can circumvent the security process in these airports, it's amazing to me that anybody can believe that security procedures put into place by the Bush administration are so wonderful.