Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
The woman who snuck onto a Delta Air Lines flight from New York City to Paris earlier this week without a boarding pass was removed from the return flight on Saturday due to disruptions prior to takeoff.
CBS News has confirmed that a stowaway caused disruption on Delta flight no. 265 departing from Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport to John F. Kennedy International Airport.
He was taken away by French law enforcement, causing a delay of more than two hours before the flight was supposed to take off. She will not be returned to the United States on Saturday and will remain in French custody for the time being, CBS News has learned.
French authorities had escorted him to the plane but did not travel with him. On board she became a nuisance and the police were called to remove her.
Although authorities have not released her name, two people familiar with the case identified the woman as 57-year-old Swellan Daly to CBS News on Saturday.
The woman has a driver’s license that shows she is a resident of Philadelphia. She is in the U.S. on a green card, according to an acquaintance who did not immediately know her home country. The French Ministry of the Interior identified him as a Russian citizen.
The situation initially unfolded on Tuesday, when a woman boarded Delta flight No. 265 from JFK Airport to Paris without a boarding pass. The flight was not sold out and she was discovered when a flight attendant became concerned that the woman was making frequent and prolonged visits to various restrooms on the Boeing 767-400ER, according to a source familiar with the incident.
French police arrived on the plane after it landed and took him into custody.
At this time, U.S. federal authorities do not plan to charge her with a federal crime, a person familiar with the matter told CBS News. However, she could face state criminal charges in New York, possibly state charges of criminal trespass.
Passenger Rob Jackson, who filmed a video of French authorities arriving on the plane after it landed in Paris, told CBS News he noticed the flight attendants acting strangely as the flight landed.
“I heard them say, for example, we have a passenger who we think is hiding in the toilet during takeoff,” Jackson said. “She doesn’t have a seat. She didn’t have a boarding pass. And basically she’s a stowaway.”
A Transportation Security Administration source told CBS News that the woman went through an advanced imaging technology body scanner at a JFK airport checkpoint after apparently avoiding the document and ID check part of the TSA process. Her bags were also scanned for prohibited items before she went to the gate and boarded the flight, the source said.
A TSA spokesperson confirmed in a statement that the woman “was physically screened without a boarding pass” and then “passed through two identity verification and boarding status stations and boarded the aircraft.”
After a TSA security check, it’s unclear exactly how the woman boarded the plane without showing Delta employees a boarding pass or passport.
French law enforcement and the TSA are investigating separately. A woman could be subject to civil penalties or fines for circumventing the document verification process.
