$1.9 Million Seized at Airport; Suspect Flees

A man who tried to take three suitcases stuffed with more than $1.9 million in cash--presumed to be drug money--from Los Angeles to Zurich, Switzerland, was being sought by U.S. Customs agents Friday after his trip was diverted by an alert airline ticket agent.

The suspect apparently slipped out of a Los Angeles International Airport terminal Thursday afternoon while the Los Angeles Police Department bomb squad used small charges to open the suitcases, revealing $1,957,000 in denominations ranging from $5 to $100.

The seizure brings to $31 million the total of unreported international cash transfers seized at the airport this year. Most of that is believed to be related to drug transactions, said U.S. Customs agent Joseph Charles.

“Any time someone is trying to move that much cash, it usually comes from drug transactions,” Lt. Dan Cooke, a police spokesman, said of the latest seizure. “We can only assume that at this point, and so the investigation continues.”

Investigators believe they know the suspect’s identity, Charles said. He declined to divulge the man’s name or nationality, or to give a description with the investigation in progress. The man was believed to still be in the Los Angeles area, Charles said at a press conference Friday.

In addition to the possibility of narcotics involvement, the suspect violated federal law by failing to report an international currency transfer of more than $10,000, Charles said.

Different authorities offered slightly different versions of what aroused the suspicions of a ticket clerk about the man hoping to board Pan American World Airways Flight 90, bound from Los Angeles to New York and Zurich.

The suspect had already exchanged a ticket for Istanbul, Turkey, for a ticket for Zurich, and his “nervous” behavior tipped off the ticket agent, according to Officer John Hadley of the Los Angeles airport police substation.

Charles said the Pan Am clerk was alerted by “a wiring mechanism on the locks” of the suitcases, apparently as a guard against tampering.

Ann White, a spokeswoman for Pan Am in New York, said the ticket agent “noticed the name on the ticket did not match the name on the three bags he wanted to check.”

In any case, the ticket clerk, whose name was not disclosed, had workers pull the suitcases from the the conveyor and X-ray them. The X-rays revealed “a bulk item,” Charles said. One suitcase also contained wires.

Los Angeles police were then called and the bomb squad was dispatched to the terminal. After moving the bags to a safe area, the bomb squad at about 12:20 p.m. used low-grade explosives to open the bags, revealing the cash. The suitcases contained nothing else.

But by then, the man apparently had left the terminal.

The seizure was the third-largest unreported sum confiscated at the airport by Customs agents, Charles said. In February, agents found $2.3 million concealed in a cargo load of air compressors, and in March they seized about $1.9 million. Convictions have followed in both cases, Charles said.

Illicit money transfers have also been linked to gun sales.

Charles said that luggage placed on international flights is not routinely X-rayed.

“We do it on an as-required basis,” Pan Am’s White said. “We feel what happened yesterday was a typical example of our security system working.”

The failure to report an international currency transfer of more than $10,000 carries a penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.