US Air Marshall in Quarantine After Being Attacked with Syringe in Nigeria

 

A US air Marshall is currently in quarantine in Houston, Texas today, after reportedly being attacked with a syringe by an unknown individual at the Murtala Muhammed International airport in Lagos.

The attack was said to be unprovoked. The assailant injected the air marshal with an unknown substance, abc News reports.

Sources say the air marshal was traveling with a team of his colleagues when the assault occurred in an “unsecured area” of the airport terminal.

After the incident, he boarded his United Airlines flight to Houston, where he was met by health workers from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and FBI agents.

Due to concerns that the substance he was injected with could have potentially contained some form of Ebola Virus, authorities immediately placed him in quarantine.

According to an FBI spokesperson, “The victim did not exhibit any signs of illness during the flight and was transported to a hospital upon landing for further testing. None of the testing conducted has indicated a danger to other passengers.”

Although the individual that attacked the marshal escaped, the other air marshals who were with him at the airport, were able to secure the needle, and take it to the US for testing.

U.S air marshals typically travel undercover in plain clothes. So it is unclear whether the assailant knew the identity of his target.

Speaking on the incident, Jon Adler, national president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said:

“While there is no immediate intelligence to confirm this was a targeted attack, this is our reminder that international cowards will attempt to take sneaky lethal shots at our honorable men and women abroad.”