Surveillance video captures assault on TSA officers at Miami airport

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Surveillance video exclusively obtained Wednesday by Local 10 News shows a man assaulting two Transportation Security Administration officers in a late-December incident at Miami International Airport.

Leer en español

According to authorities, it happened Dec. 28, 2024, a day after Cameron Dylan McDougall, 28, of Toronto, had been kicked off a flight.

The video shows a man, who authorities identified as McDougall, swinging at one officer before another intervenes and McDougall falls backward to the floor.

McDougall pleaded guilty on May 19 in federal court to two counts of assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers or employees. He faces up to a year in prison on each count.

He also faces state charges in connection with the incident.

McDougall was only in South Florida because of his actions on a flight between Panama and Canada, court documents state.

Authorities said he “physically struck another passenger” in the midst of a Dec. 27 Copa Airlines flight from Panama City to Toronto, prompting the pilot to divert the flight to Miami.

McDougall was removed from the flight ― but was not arrested ― and was told he could book a separate flight to Toronto on another airline, it states, leading him to buy a ticket for an Air Canada flight from Miami to Toronto the next day.

As he was at MIA to take that flight, authorities said McDougall cleared security and then, “without warning,” randomly hit another passenger at around 6:37 a.m. after he cleared security.

Prosecutors said he then struck an airport security guard who tried to intervene, then went back to the security screening area and threw three punches at a TSA supervisor, who dodged the blows, authorities said.

As another TSA officer intervened, McDougall fell to the ground and as the second officer tried holding him down, he hit the second officer in the face “at least three times,” causing minor injuries, authorities said.

He was arrested soon after by officers with what was then the Miami-Dade Police Department.

He’s scheduled to be sentenced in Miami federal court on Friday.