Airport Security Sweep Update (Austin)
Following up on the January security sweep at the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Texas, 19 former airport employees were sentenced on February 20 in U.S. District Court or Travis County (state) Court in Austin to time served and deported to Mexico. After pleading guilty to Federal charges of providing false statements to FAA or to state charges of tampering with government documents, all were placed on unsupervised probation, which means re-entry into the United States can be considered a violation of probation. During the sweep, 53 individuals were charged with allegedly falsifying information on their airport security badge applications. Of these, 29 are fugitives and 5 have pleaded not guilty and await trials, which will probably be scheduled in March. OIG conducted this investigation with the FBI, INS, Social Security Administration OIG, Treasury IG for Tax Administration, and state and local authorities.