A Nigerian immigrant made a mockery of the government’s and airlines’ security measures this week. He boarded at least one flight without a ticket, without a government-issued photo ID, and without even a valid boarding pass. His Facebook page boasted, “3 days, 3 cities, Chicago, Detroit and NOw i can spy with my little eye New york city from this Sheraton at Liberty Int’l Airport in NJ!” His body odor almost gave him away on one flight.
How many billions have we spent on airport and airplane security?
New York Times (copyright)
June 30, 2011
Wrong Name, Wrong Date, Yet Let on a Jet
By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN
When the F.B.I. caught up to Olajide Oluwaseun Noibi at Los Angeles International Airport on Wednesday, he was trying to talk a Delta Air Lines agent into letting him get on a flight to Atlanta. Mr. Noibi, 24, faced some resistance because the boarding pass in his hand was issued in another person’s name and was for a flight that had departed a day earlier, according to court documents.
In an era of heightened security, with airlines and the Transportation Security Administration on the lookout for any suspicious behavior, an old boarding pass belonging to someone else may not seem like quite enough to get a person past security and onto a plane.
But this ploy appeared to have been the basis of Mr. Noibi’s travel arrangements, and it apparently worked for him on at least one earlier occasion, the Federal Bureau of Investigation contends. Five days earlier, Mr. Noibi flew to Los Angeles from Kennedy International Airport using a boarding pass that had disappeared the day before from the back pocket of another traveler, according to a criminal complaint.
When Mr. Noibi was arrested on charges of being a stowaway as he tried to leave Los Angeles on Wednesday, the authorities found “over 10 boarding passes in various individuals’ names” in his luggage, the complaint charges.
A Facebook profile that appears to belong to Mr. Noibi suggests he is a seasoned traveler. A message posted on June 14 reads: “3 days, 3 cities, Chicago, Detroit and NOw i can spy with my little eye New york city from this Sheraton at Liberty Int’l Airport in NJ!”
Mr. Noibi’s travel arrangements came under scrutiny after he boarded a Los Angeles-bound Virgin America flight at Kennedy on June 24. Investigators are still trying to determine how he managed to get by the T.S.A.’s travel document checker and the Virgin America crew at the gate. His boarding pass belonged to another passenger who later told the F.B.I. that he had lost it the day before, according to the complaint.
A spokesman for the T.S.A., Nicholas Kimball, said in an e-mailed statement that the travel document checker “did not identify that the passenger was traveling with improper travel documents.”
A spokeswoman for Virgin America, Patricia Condon, said by e-mail that “in this case it appears staff may have missed an alert when the passenger presented a boarding pass from a prior flight.”
On the Los Angeles-bound flight, two passengers complained that Mr. Noibi “had an odor and they didn’t want to sit next to him,” a spokeswoman for the F.B.I., Laura Eimiller, said. As flight crew members tried to make alternate seating arrangements, they asked Mr. Noibi to show them his boarding pass and identification, Ms. Eimiller said.
Virgin America said in a statement that its initial review “indicates that he was allowed to board at the gate with a boarding pass for a flight on a different date.” But the airline noted that it was crew members who made the discovery that Mr. Noibi was not supposed to be on the flight and then alerted the authorities.
On Saturday, when Mr. Noibi landed in Los Angeles, the F.B.I. interviewed him, conducted background checks and examined his luggage. The bureau decided he did not pose an immediate threat and decided to let him go as it investigated further, Ms. Eimiller said.
She said the F.B.I. knew that Mr. Noibi would be traveling on Wednesday because he had made a reservation in his name to be on the Delta flight to Atlanta, although he never purchased a ticket.
At 6 a.m. Wednesday, federal agents were on hand to watch Mr. Noibi try to persuade a Delta employee to let him board the Atlanta-bound flight. The employee rebuffed Mr. Noibi repeatedly, at which point the authorities arrested him, according to the criminal complaint.
At the time of his arrest, Mr. Noibi, who the authorities say is a dual citizen of the United States and Nigeria, had only one form of identification, a University of Michigan identification card, according to the criminal complaint. He told the agent that he was in Los Angeles to recruit candidates for a software business.
A lawyer for Mr. Noibi, Carl Gunn, declined to discuss the case in detail but said that the allegations were “at the lower end of the continuum of seriousness in crime in cases prosecuted in federal court.”
Mr. Noibi was in United States District Court in Los Angeles on Wednesday for a brief appearance and is expected back in court on Friday.