A woman who stowed away on a Delta flight from New York to Paris last month has been captured again, this time trying to sneak into Canada, multiple law enforcement sources told CNN.
A law enforcement official said Svetlana Dali’s ankle monitor was successfully removed on Sunday. She was then taken into custody Monday while boarding a Greyhound bus bound for Canada, officials said. It was not immediately clear how close she was to the border.
Dali is currently in FBI custody and is scheduled to be turned over to U.S. marshals in Buffalo, New York, on Tuesday, one of the people said. The FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York declined to comment on Dali’s detention.
Dali’s lawyer, Michael Schneider, also declined to comment.
Dali was staying with a roommate who reported her missing after seeing her ankle monitor on the floor, another law enforcement official added.
She is scheduled to appear before a judge in Buffalo before returning to Brooklyn, the source added. Dalli is expected to be charged with bail jumping, which could carry a sentence of up to five years in federal prison.
Dali, a Russian citizen and permanent resident of the United States, was charged with one count of stowing away on a ship or aircraft without consent in connection with the Nov. 26 incident on the Paris-bound plane. She was released without paying bail, but with a number of conditions, including a ban on traveling outside the designated area.
The judge in her stowaway case, Judge Joseph Martolo, expressed concern about releasing Dali after the previous incident, but Schneider successfully argued for her release.
“We do not believe she is a significant flight risk. … She cannot sneak off on a plane every day,” he said at the court hearing.
Prosecutor Brooke Theodora said her office believes Dali is a flight risk and called the incident a security breach that raises national security and safety concerns.
Mr. Martolo ruled that Dali cannot go to the airport, must submit to GPS monitoring, submit travel documents, and cannot leave the region where he is staying or where he is being charged. He also ruled that she must abide by a curfew and receive a diagnosis and recommended mental health treatment.
Mr. Dali was to live in Philadelphia with an acquaintance from church, who told the court that he was willing to let him live there because he had nowhere else to go. That acquaintance was the one who reported Dali missing.
How authorities claim Dali stowed away
On November 26, Dali sneaked onto Delta Airlines Flight 264 from New York’s JFK International Airport to Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport.
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York said in a criminal complaint filed Thursday that Dalli “did not have a ticket and intentionally used TSA security guards and Delta Air Lines flights so that he could travel without purchasing a ticket.” “He stated that he avoided the employees of the company.” .
According to the complaint, investigators reviewed surveillance footage from New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport and noted that Dali was turned away at a Transportation Security Administration security checkpoint because he did not have a boarding pass. But five minutes later, she returned and was able to get through the TSA checkpoint by going to the airline employee lane.
She headed to the departure gate, where “Delta employees, who were busy helping ticketed passengers board, did not stop her or ask for her boarding pass before boarding the plane.” ” the complaint says.
One passenger said she hid in the bathroom from the crew in an attempt to avoid detection.
“I heard the flight attendant talking to the pilot about it,” Rob Jackson, a New York City real estate broker, told CNN. “They said this person was in one bathroom and then got out and walked to another bathroom and was in there for a long time.”
Jackson said the crew did not inform them that there was a stowaway among the passengers until the plane landed in the French capital.
“The first time passengers were informed that there was a problem was when we parked at the gate, and as French police were scheduled to board the plane to deal with a ‘serious safety incident’, all passengers “They were instructed to remain seated,” he said.
In the video recorded by Jackson, a voice over the plane’s intercom says, “Guys, this is the captain. We’re just waiting for the police to come on board. They could be here right now, they could be on the plane.” They instructed us to keep everyone on the plane until we could sort out the extra passengers.”
Dali was detained by French police, who determined she was ineligible to enter the country and ordered her extradition to the United States.
Who is Svetlana Dali? What do we know about her?
Records show that Dali once lived in the Philadelphia area.
Authorities have not said whether she had previously tried to sneak onto a plane or whether she was previously known to law enforcement. It is unknown how long she had been in the United States.
Dalí has filed two lawsuits in recent months alleging he is the victim of military chemical weapons and a kidnapping plot, according to court records.
She had applied for asylum in France several years ago, a Paris airport official told CNN.
After being detained at a Paris airport, she was scheduled to return to the United States on November 30, but was removed from a Delta flight to New York after causing a disturbance before takeoff.
She finally took off on December 4, flanked by two French security officials.
During the flight, she would sometimes rest her head on the front seat and stare at the floor, or listen to music with her eyes closed.
After landing, Dalí declined to be interviewed by CNN.
CNN has reached out to Dali’s family and friends to learn more about him, but has not received a response.
CNN’s Bryn Gingras, Holmes Lybrand, Saskia Vandoorne and Rex Harvey contributed to this report.
Correction: An earlier version of this article had Assistant U.S. Attorney Brooke Theodora’s first and last name reversed.
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