Southwest Baggage Handler Stole Guns From Travelers in St. Louis
A former Southwest Airlines employee will serve six months in prison after admitting to stealing at least five firearms from checked bags belonging to passengers traveling through St. Louis Lambert International Airport.
Mark Hunter, of St. Louis, previously pleaded guilty in federal court for possession of stolen firearms. He had been indicted in April.
According to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, the case against Hunter began in September, when the Manchester Police Department seized a pistol that had been reported stolen by a Southwest passenger. The passenger told police that the firearm had been taken from his luggage.
That's when federal investigators got involved. Agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, along with the Transportation Security Administration, identified seven similar firearm thefts: All had been reported as stolen from checked luggage on Southwest Airlines flights during a roughly five-month span between March and August 2020.
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