A man accused of causing a loud noise which sent travelers stampeding through Las Vegas’ Harry Reid International Airport early Sunday morning was arrested a second time at the same airport less than 24 hours later.
Updated Wednesday, August 17 10:00 a.m. EST - The Associated Press reports two airline employees were injured in the ruckus. Both were injured while trying to stop the suspect. Here’s how police now describe Hutchison’s arrests:
Stefan Mathias Hutchison, 33, of Oakland, told arresting officers he wanted to go home immediately, not wait for a flight on Monday. Police said he had also been arrested Saturday at the airport on misdemeanor charges after pushing past Transportation Security Administration screeners in what police also called a security breach.
Hutchison remained jailed ahead of a court date Wednesday before a Las Vegas judge on a burglary charge based on Nevada law making it a felony to enter a building with an intent to commit a crime.
It’s not clear what caused the loud noise in Terminal 1 that was mistaken for gunfire at 4:30 a.m. Sunday. The noise was followed by crowds of people moving away and causing further noise. Panic spread, and waves of travelers ran from what they thought was an active shooter.
What is known is that police arrested California man Stefan Hutchison and charged him with misdemeanor counts of public conduct at an airport and resisting a public officer. Las Vegas Police described Hutchison as an “unruly person” and the noise a “security incident.” It turns out, he may have been angry over his previous arrest less than 24 hours earlier at the airport, according to News 3 Las Vegas:
Hutchison, 33, of Carmichael, California, was taken into custody at the airport on a felony burglary charge and held at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas pending a court appearance, records showed. Hutchison was not armed, Hadfield said.
On Saturday, Hutchison had been arrested about 8:30 a.m. on misdemeanor misconduct and resisting an officer charges, and freed from jail without bail later that day. The initial police call in that case was about a possible airport security breach, Hadfield said.
On Monday, Hutchison refused to be taken from the jail to appear before a judge. Court records showed he was rescheduled to appear in court Wednesday morning. A deputy public defender who was appointed temporarily to represent him did not immediately respond to messages.
Hutchison sounds like exactly the type of guy you don’t want to be stuck in a pressurized tube with for a few hours. The scene at the airport was total chaos. Fox5 spoke to a few of the travelers about the incident:
Prior to being asked to re-screen, several travelers told FOX5 that they were able to walk through security un-checked because TSA agents had reportedly abandoned their posts during the panic.
“Half of the security line dropped to the ground,” airport traveler Christopher Neece told FOX5. “The other half started to step over those on the ground to get through security. You either ran with them or got knocked down. When I arrived at the front of security, there wasn’t a single TSA agent present.”
In a video provided by another traveler, he can be heard saying, “no one knows what’s happening, we’re just piling through,” as he traipses through the metal detectors with his luggage in hand.
“People were running, people that were already in line to get through TSA, they were scrambling and just ran through the metal detectors,” said Tawanna Malpress, who was attempting to go back home to Orlando after getting married in Las Vegas this weekend.
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Malpress said, “It did actually sound like gunshots. It was really really loud, you could hear it throughout the airport... people just started running everywhere, just running out of the airport, just running all over the airport, and my family and I just start hiding behind the kiosk machine.”
Malpress was at Spirit Airline’s front desk for checking bags when she said she heard the loud sound in question. She said employees began to panic and an employee screamed.
“The young lady screamed, she worked for Spirit, she screamed to the top of her lungs, she was like, ‘Don’t do that! You can’t come back there!’ And she was just screaming really loud... So by that time, it’s a stampede of people,” said Malpress.
The loud noise caused TSA agents to run for cover, leaving checkpoints open for panicking travelers to stream through. A spokesperson for the TSA told Fox5 the agents acted appropriately. TSA agents are not law enforcement agents, and are instructed to “run, hide, fight” in the event of an active shooter.
All of the fleeing passengers needed to be rechecked, causing lines to back up to the parking garage and delaying or canceling flights. An airport spokesmen told News 3 that there was no information on injuries at the scene.