Major Security Breach at Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport: TSA screening with a fake boarding pass
Published by RawNews1st
Major Security Breach at Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport;
25-year-old Houston man Abdulrahman Oriyomi is facing felony charges after authorities say he slipped through TSA screening with a fake boarding pass and boarded a United flight to Los Angeles.
He moved through multiple security layers, blended in with passengers, and got past the gate while employees were distracted.
Once onboard, he sat in the wrong seat, bounced between bathrooms, used a false name, and even helped force the plane back to the gate.
Police say Oriyomi then approached a gate and tried twice to scan the fake boarding pass, but to no avail.
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More than an hour later, they say he showed up at another gate where United gate agents were scanning boarding passes.
Police say Oriyomi walked right past the agents while they were busy with other passengers.
“They’re not paying attention to his diversionary tactics. They’re distracted, they’re not situationally aware,” said Matranga.
Police say Oriyomi hid in the plane’s restroom as it taxied to the runway, and that a passenger alerted flight attendants to his presence.
Once the flight crew realized he wasn’t supposed to be on the plane, it returned to the gate where it was met by police, an explosive device unit and the FBI.
Matranga said all of that could have been avoided had Oriyomi been stopped from the beginning at the TSA screening checkpoint.
“At a very minimum, those agents that were directly involved and probably that whole cadre of agents at the airport need to be retrained on policy and consistency in policy,” he said.
Oriyomi was questioned the same day and given a trespass warning, but charges were not filed until June 1, and he wasn’t arrested until Friday morning.
The Harris County District Attorney’s Office said HPD didn’t approach it about filing charges until June.
The flight was delayed for hours.
