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French newspaper Le Parisien broke the story |
FRANCE. A gang of ground staff were arrested at Paris Roissy Airport yesterday for stealing truck-loads of luxury items from Air France’s inflight duty free carts.
More than 180 officers from the Gendarmerie des Transport Aeriens, a team of police officers specialising in transport law enforcement, began the raids at 6am which saw more than 20 employees taken in.
Police recovered high-value goods including fragrances, watches, liquor, cigarettes and silk scarves.
The people stealing the items were employed by the catering company Servair 1, Air France’s catering and handling subsidiary, which stocks the airline’s duty free carts. The operation was carried out at terminal one of Paris Roissy Airport.
Pierre Freyssinet, CEO of Logair which is the subsidiary operating the Air France contract, said: “We are delighted and relieved by the outcome of this long investigation by the French Gendarmerie. They obviously wanted to catch the big fishes and this is why it took some time, but it was clearly worth it. We were happy to support the law-enforcement officers with the introduction in September 2004 of the SafeTrolley, which proved to be helpful. The benefits of the Gendarmerie operation are huge – not only for us but for our client Air France and for the suppliers. Products stolen from the duty free carts are no longer available for sale on-board, but considering the quantities at stake, were probably made available for other retail channels.”
The SafeTrolley system recorded when the carts were opened and helped the police identify the location of the goods when they were lifted from the carts.
The police are holding a press conference today on the operation.
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