Written by John Morris, WheelchairTravel.org, June 10, 2024
Any person can fall victim of petty theft, and the lesson is obvious — never leave your bags unattended or unsecured.
When I awoke from a two-hour nap in New York’s LaGuardia Airport, I reached for my backpack, which hangs from a hook on the back of my wheelchair. It wasn’t there.
The feeling that arises from the fear of a lost item is distressing. My muscles tensed as my panic swelled. I turned to look behind my chair, my mind racing with the dreaded thought that I had been robbed when I saw it — my backpack, hanging not from the left hook where I normally place it, but from the right hook that is more difficult for me to reach.
That’s strange, I thought. Odd indeed for me to have struggled to put the backpack on that hook. Perhaps I had moved it there during my earlier trip to the bathroom, where I had gone before finding a place to nap on the floor of the LaGuardia terminal building? My backpack was there, with my laptop still inside, so all was good — right?
Despite my most valuable possessions being intact, I could not shake the idea that something was amiss. As I turned, I noticed something on the floor about ten feet away that was either a coincidence or evidence that my luggage had been tampered with, that my trust had been violated in my sleep.
Let’s back up a moment to answer your obvious question — Why was I sleeping on the floor of an airport in New York City?
The night prior, I had flown from Rome, Italy to New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. The flight arrived just after 8:00 p.m., but I didn’t make it to the arrivals hall until about 10:00 p.m., due in large part to the delayed return of my power wheelchair and the airline’s gate agent threatening me with arrest.
My connecting flight home departed early the next morning from a different airport, New York’s LaGuardia Airport, and I arrived there just before midnight (after riding the JFK AirTrain, then catching an UberWAV to the airport). Hotels around LaGuardia were sold out, and reserving an expensive hotel farther away for just a few hours of rest didn’t seem worth it. Like many airports, LaGuardia is open 24 hours per day, and I decided to hang out there until security opened at 4:00 a.m
I worked on my laptop for a short while, but struggled to keep my eyes open. I needed to take a nap, and began searching for a place to lie down. There were few benches in the airport’s public areas, a design decision by the port authority to make New York’s airports a less desirable spot for the city’s homeless population. That decision also makes things more difficult for passengers who, like me, need a place to hang out or rest for just a few hours before an early morning flight.
In the arrivals hall, I saw many passengers sleeping on the floor, so I decided to do the same. I found a spot in a well lit area and lowered myself onto the floor. I’m primarily a side sleeper, so I put one of my two duffle bags under my head and the other under my leg. Foolishly, I left my backpack attached to my wheelchair, but I honestly didn’t think there was much to worry about — people were in the terminal, it was well lit, and there are security cameras everywhere. I dozed off, but woke up a few times due to discomfort from the hard floor.
When I awoke, the backpack being on the wrong hook was suspicious, but evidence of nothing. When I turned around and saw, on the floor about ten feet away, a receipt from an airline wheelchair tag, I was all but certain it had come from my bag. I fly often, and have 20 or more of those receipts in my bag at any given time. While many other wheelchair users fly too, it seemed more than a coincidence to find one of those near me and at baggage claim, rather than at check-in or the gate where those receipts are given to passengers.
I approached a police officer in the airport, and shared my suspicions. I asked to review security camera footage to set my mind at ease, and to answer the question — had I been robbed?
The officer and his partner were incredibly helpful, connected with members of the airport security team, and gained access to the video footage I sought. They were able to zoom in on me, my wheelchair and luggage from multiple angles — and also, it turns out, a suspicious person who had been in the area.
As it turns out, I was right to be suspicious of my backpack being on the wrong baggage hook. An unidentified man approached my wheelchair and the backpack from the left hook. He returned moments later, after I had turned to lay on my back, and grabbed the duffle bag that had previously been under my leg.
He walked away with the two bags, rifled through them searching for who knows what (money, food, credit cards?), then came back to return the bags. Except, he placed the backpack on the wrong hook, which raised alarm after I had awoken.
I had indeed been robbed, but the thief left the most valuable possessions — a laptop, kindle book reader, AirPods and of course the clothing in my duffle bag. Only a few knick-knacks were taken which had little value, and those weren’t in my bags at all, but in the storage pocket that hangs from my wheelchair’s armrest. That was the last place he searched.
No one deserves to be a victim of crime, so I won’t be hard on myself for defaulting to an attitude of trust towards my fellow man, but I have learned a lesson nonetheless. I got lucky, to be sure — had the thief not returned my bags, I would be thousands of dollars in the hole replacing a laptop, clothing, and other tools that I use to travel the world. Should I find myself sleeping in an airport again, I won’t make the same mistake of leaving my backpack unprotected and out in the open, and I’ll devise some strategy to bind my duffle bags together.
The police asked me if I wanted to press charges, but I declined to do so. I wasn’t sure what the right decision was, and I suspect readers will have a diversity of opinions on the matter, but my losses were minor and I was otherwise unharmed. The lesson learned is more valuable to me than any restitution might have been, and I’ll use what I have learned to be more thoughtful about the way that I travel and protect my valuables.
I suppose, given the frequency of petty crime, I am lucky it has taken more than 10 years of traveling as a wheelchair user to fall victim to theft. But I am curious — Have you ever been the victim of a crime while traveling? Let me know in the comments, so we might learn from your experiences too!
Safe travels, and talk to you soon,
—John