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    • Secret Service apologizes for break-in at Massachusetts salon, reports
    Massachusetts

    Secret Service apologizes for break-in at Massachusetts salon, reports

    Idris Bevan Posted on

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    A Massachusetts salon owner said she felt “violated” after the U.S. Secret Service covered her security camera and other officials entered her business without permission during an event for Vice President Kamala Harris, according to multiple reports.

    Alicia Powers, owner of Four One Three Salon in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, told Business Insider she decided to close her business on July 27 when Harris was scheduled to hold an in-person fundraiser at the nearby Colonial Theater.

    But their surveillance footage, obtained by Spectrum News 1 Worcester, shows a person dressed like a Secret Service officer taping over the lens of a security camera outside the building. Powers said footage from inside the building shows several officers in various uniforms coming in to use the restroom when the alarm went off.

    “For about an hour and a half, there were several people in the house on and off – they were just using my bathroom, the alarms were going off, they were using my counter, without permission,” Powers told Business Insider.

    USSS spokeswoman Melissa McKenzie told USA TODAY on Tuesday that the woman in the video is an agent, but she did not enter the salon or send others there. Still, Powers said the USSS apologized to her. The reported misstep came after the agency faced increased scrutiny following an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump and the director resigned.

    More: The intelligence agency will reconsider a “unified command post” that does not involve all parties

    Surveillance footage shows security guards in the salon with alarm

    A video obtained by Business Insider shows the Secret Service agent entering the salon, looking into the cameras and doors, then pulling up a chair, standing on it and apparently covering the camera with tape.

    Footage from inside the salon shows two people in paramedic uniforms and one person in a police uniform.

    Powers said she returned later that day to tape over a still image from the camera and left the door unlocked. She told Spectrum News Worcester she felt “violated and disrespected” and was “completely baffled that permission was not given or even asked to use the bathroom.”

    Both media outlets reported that she also said that Secret Service representatives had since contacted her and apologized.

    “The U.S. Secret Service works closely with our partners in the business community to carry out our protective and investigative mission,” USSS spokeswoman Melissa McKenzie said in an emailed statement. “The Secret Service has since communicated with the business owner involved. We greatly value these relationships and our personnel would not enter or direct our partners to enter a business without the owner’s permission.”

    USA TODAY has reached out to Powers for comment.

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    Idris Bevan
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