U.S.-Costa Rican Man
Killed by Federal Air Marshal

The man fatally shot yesterday by a U.S. air marshal in the Miami International Airport after claiming to have a bomb in his backpack was U.S.-Costa Rican citizen Rigoberto Alpizar, Costa Rica 's Channel 7 TV News reported last night.

Despite Alpizar's alleged threat, subsequent inspection found no explosives in his luggage. The incident has sparked a media frenzy as to whether the marshal's actions were warranted.

Alpizar, 44, was a resident of Florida. He regularly spoke to his Costa Rican family and was here in July when his father was sick, Alpizar's brother told Channel 7.

Alpizar arrived in Miami yesterday from Ecuador and had just boarded American Airlines Flight 924, which originated in Colombia and was bound for the U.S. city of Orlando, where he lived with his wife, a U.S. citizen named Anne Buechner Martin, the daily La Nación reported.

At a press conference last night, James E. Bauer, agent in charge of the Federal Air Marshals field office in Miami, said that shortly after boarding the plane, Alpizar indicated he had a bomb in his backpack and began running from the aircraft.

Bauer said Alpizar at first refused to stop when ordered to do so by air marshals who had been aboard the flight. He then turned around and began to approach the agents in a threatening manner, at which point one of the marshals opened fire.

Authorities examined all of the luggage aboard the aircraft, even exploding a few suitcases on the tarmac, but found no trace of explosives.

Bauer said the investigation had turned up no sign Alpizar had links to terrorists, while Miami police said none of the other 118 passengers was hurt in the incident.

According to Brian Doyle, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, the air marshal shot Alpizar after the passenger refused to lie on the ground as ordered, and instead reached inside his backpack.

Mary Gardner, one of the passengers, told Miami's WTVJ-TV that she had seen Alpizar running in a frenzy toward the plane's exit door, followed by a woman shouting, ‘My husband! My husband!'

Gardner added that she heard the woman saying that her husband was bipolar and had not taken his medication.

Bipolarity is a personality disorder characterized by wild swings between depression to euphoria, and requires regular treatment with prescription drugs.

Alpizar was born in Nicoya, in the northwest Costa Rican province of Guanacaste, and is the second of four brothers, La Nación reported. He had lived in the United States for 20 years and worked for the hardware store chain Home Depot.

Alpizar's brother told Channel 7 he had not noticed anything strange about his brother's behavior in recent years. He said the incident was “shocking” and “a police mistake.”

“I really don't understand what it was that happened. But for us it is shocking. I feel very bad,” he said.

Alpizar's sister-in-law, Violeta Castro, added that Alpizar was hardworking and cared very much about his family.

Alpizar's brother also said he would consider a trip to the United States to find more answers, but in the meantime is asking for the intervention of the Costa Rican government to find out what happened.

Officials have already said they will do just that, according to Channel 7.

This was the first time a U.S. air marshal has fired a gun on duty since more armed officers were deployed to airliners in the aftermath of the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Bloomberg reported. Air marshals are specifically trained for situations within aircraft, such as in aisles or seats.

The Federal Air Marshals, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and local Florida police are all involved in an investigation of the incident, CNN reported.

“I think there should be a full investigation and I think there should be second-guessing; this was a very serious incident,” Clark Kent, former Secretary General of the Department of Homeland Security, told CNN. “There has been a loss of life… I would confirm that the facts are as we think they are, and if they are, then we would have to express our condolences and sympathies to the Alpizar family. But I think in the end, we would have to conclude that the air marshal or air marshals in question did exactly the right thing.”

–ACAN-EFE and Costa Rican press reports

See Friday's print or online PDF edition of The Tico Times for more on the events surrounding Alpizar's death.