The lady who snuck aboard a Delta jet from New York Metropolis to Paris final 12 months allegedly tried the identical trick two days earlier at Connecticut’s Bradley Worldwide Airport, in keeping with court docket paperwork.
Svetlana Dali, 57, is jailed in New York on a federal stowaway cost pending a Might 19 trial. She has pleaded not responsible, and her protection legal professionals are reportedly engaged on a plea deal.
Dali was first arrested in Paris in November after mixing in with different passengers and flight crew members to slide previous gate brokers and board the Delta flight sans boarding move or another journey paperwork.
Nevertheless, that was not Dali’s first rodeo, in keeping with a memorandum filed this week in Brooklyn federal court docket. She had allegedly tried to slide by way of safety at Bradley Worldwide Airport in Connecticut’s Hartford County simply 48 hours earlier than efficiently doing so at JFK, and had tried the identical at Miami Worldwide Airport again in February 2024.
At Bradley, Dali was seen on surveillance video twice attempting to enter TSA safety checkpoints with no boarding move, prosecutors stated. The primary time she was thwarted, however the second time she made it by way of, carrying the identical boots and toting the identical backpack as she had at JFK.
“Although there is no evidence that the defendant boarded or traveled on a flight illegally from BDL, the BDL security footage shows that the defendant bypassed BDL security checkpoints in a manner that is strikingly similar to her conduct at JFK and MIA,” prosecutors stated.
To take action, she allegedly hid amongst passengers whereas workers was vetting different folks, camouflaged her manner by way of safety and hid within the rest room. She additionally acquired in line for a home JetBlue flight however didn’t make it onto the airplane, prosecutors stated.
In Miami, Dali was discovered within the airport’s safe worldwide arrivals zone previous U.S. Customs. Whereas she claimed that she had simply arrived by way of Air France and was ready for her husband, the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent who questioned her stated he “could not find any records of the defendant on an Air France flight that day, and that there were no records of the defendant leaving the United States for approximately the last five years,” the court docket data state.
Prosecutors argue that Dali’s prior conduct ought to be admissible as proof as a result of it “shows that the defendant’s actions at JFK were methodically planned based on her past experience” and had been “deliberately and intentionally designed to obtain air transportation without consent.”
Dali was detained in November after touching down in Paris and despatched again to the U.S. to face federal prices of being a stowaway on a vessel or plane with out consent.
Initially launched on the situation she keep away from airports and undergo GPS monitoring, the Russian nationwide and U.S. everlasting resident was arrested once more a number of weeks later after lopping off her ankle bracelet and making an attempt to cross into Canada by Greyhound bus. She has been jailed with out bail ever since.
A conviction may carry a five-year jail sentence.
