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05/21/2009: "Woman prosecuted in Canada for not holding on to dirty escalator handrail"

The Montreal woman who was handcuffed and fined $420 for not holding a subway station escalator handrail is planning to fight the tickets, saying she was treated like a "criminal" for trying to avoid germs.

"They are dirty!" said Bela Kosoian about the rubber handrails. "How many people touch them every day? Thousands!

As a citizen of France who lived in Eastern Europe, Ms. Kosoian never expected this kind of encounter with authority when she came to Canada in 2003.

"I lived through the collapse of the Soviet Union. Civil war in Georgia. And famine, where you had to fight for a piece of bread."

[ This is the "free" society we are supposed to be so eager to protect. ]

http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=1610486