In New York, officials informed ABC News that a Russian national is the woman accused of unlawfully boarding a Delta Airlines flight without valid travel documents.
The woman, who is a legal resident of the United States, did not have valid documents to enter France, where she had previously applied for asylum.
The woman was put on a flight back to the US, but new video shows personnel attempting to restrain the unruly passenger on November 30.
She was taken off the flight and put back into police custody and will remain in France temporarily.
In a video recording, the woman expressed her reluctance to return to the United States, citing protection under asylum and making references to the Geneva Conventions.
The incident involved Delta Flight 264 departing from JFK Airport and arriving at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris the following day with an unauthorized individual who managed to evade security measures, as per officials.
Police boarded the plane at the Paris airport, according to a video from a passenger that was shared on social media. “This is the captain. We’re just waiting for the police to come on board,” the pilot can be heard saying.
Daniel Velez, a spokesperson for the Transportation Security Administration, said “an individual without a boarding pass” was screened at Kennedy and was not carrying any prohibited items.
“TSA takes any incidents that occur at any of our checkpoints nationwide seriously,” Velez said. “TSA will independently review the circumstances of this incident at our travel document checker station at JFK.”
A Delta spokesperson said in a statement, “Nothing is of greater importance than matters of safety and security. That’s why Delta is conducting an exhaustive investigation of what may have occurred and will work collaboratively with other aviation stakeholders and law enforcement to that end.”
The French National Police said Friday, “A passenger of Russian nationality was smuggled onto a flight from NY (JFK) to Roissy-Charles de Gaulle.”
The passenger “was refused entry to France for lack of a valid travel document (visa), and was placed in a waiting area for the time needed to return her to the United States as she held a valid US residence permit,” the National Police said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates Kennedy Airport, declined to comment.
Federal investigators are looking into how the woman breached several security points at JFK and slipped onto the plane without a boarding pass.
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