MA, Flight school students arrested Concerns raised on antiterror net; 34 immigrants

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http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/11/05/flight_school_arrests_raise_terrorism_fears/?p1=News_links

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http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2010/nov/tsa-clears-illegal-aliens-flight-training


TSA Clears Flight Training For Illegal Immigrants

Nearly a decade after the nation's deadliest terrorist attack, “strict security controls” didn’t stop dozens of illegal immigrants from receiving government clearance to train as pilots in the U.S. just as the 9/11 hijackers had done.

The unbelievable story comes via a Massachusetts news station that exposes the government’s failure to adequately protect the nation since Middle Eastern terrorists, trained at American flight schools, crashed airplanes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. As a result of the 2001 massacre, the government supposedly implemented strict security measures to prevent undocumented foreigners from training at American flight schools.

Incredibly, illegal immigrants still get cleared to take flight lessons because the Homeland Security agency (Transportation Security Administration—TSA) that approves candidates doesn’t bother checking the central agency’s immigration database when it screens foreign flight-school applicants. That means flight schools throughout the U.S. could easily be filled with undocumented foreigners that could represent a national security threat.

At a flight school in Stow, a rural community about 25 miles west of Boston, more than 30 illegal aliens were cleared by the TSA to train as pilots. This week three of them said they came to the U.S. from Brazil legally but their visas expired, just like several of the 9/11 hijackers. Each man provided official TSA documents approving pilot lessons through the agency’s alien flight student program. The Brazilians assure the agency never asked them about their immigration status.

Now that they have flown for dozens of hours each, the government plans to deport them only because the media exposed the scandalous story. In a typical response for a government agency with egg on its face, TSA officials said they will “review the process” for clearing foreign nationals to become licensed pilots. In the meantime, the agency assures it performs a “thorough background check on each applicant.”

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http://azstarnet.com/news/national/article_efb579fe-a64b-54a4-9451-71682d53ff68.html


Authorities wonder how 33 illegal immigrants got approval for flying school


BOSTON - Federal officials could not explain Friday how more than 30 immigrants charged with being here illegally got clearance to take flying lessons at an airstrip outside Boston.

Federal law prohibits illegal immigrants from taking flight lessons under rules revamped after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. But the 33 Brazilians, arrested over the past few months and awaiting deportation hearings, somehow managed to get instruction at TJ Aviation Flight Academy at Minute Man Air Field in Stow, a rural town about 30 miles northwest of Boston.

Their instructor, also Brazilian, has also been charged with being here illegally, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Gillian Brigham.

Brigham said none of the immigrants posed a terrorism threat. But the incident, first reported by The Boston Globe, raised questions about the procedures for monitoring foreigners training to fly in the U.S.

Since 2004, the Transportation Security Administration has been required to check all foreign flight students against terrorism, criminal and immigration databases. Students must also show their passports and visas to their flight instructor, who is supposed to keep copies on file.

Greg Soule, a spokesman for the TSA, said in a statement that the agency was reviewing "the circumstances by which these individuals were issued pilots' licenses."

The owner of the flight school, Thiago DeJesus, told The Globe that the students got approval from the TSA before taking classes in single-engine planes for $165 an hour.

DeJesus, 26, said he did not know they were in the country illegally. He also denied being here illegally, saying that he came here from Brazil a decade ago.

DeJesus was not at the airfield Friday and did not respond to phone messages.

Neither he nor any of his students have been detained while they await deportation hearings in federal immigration court, Brigham said, adding that none have been criminally charged.

Jim Peters, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration, confirmed that DeJesus was licensed to fly single-engine planes and give flying lessons. The FAA was investigating DeJesus' flight school because of "safety issues," he said, although it has allowed the school to remain open.

"We can't say anything more about that," Peters said.

While the FAA issues licenses to pilots who have received proper training, he said, it does not have a role in checking whether flight students are here legally.

[Ayatollahgondola]

I wonder if anyone is checking with the nuclear regulatory commission to see if we are training illegals to use fissionable materials
:confused:

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Take a look at this from two years ago..it proves that the mass law-breaking in Stowe isn't an isolated case. The worthless Fed's led by fat-arse Nappy have known about it for years, and still do nothing.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4353991&page=1

Michelle Malkin has a piece on www.vdare.com datelined 11/09 and I got the hot-link from that piece. Whistleblowers have been trying to protect the public, but they've been ignored. When the next 9-11 happens, the Usual Suspects will then pretend they didn't see it coming...just like El Presidente Jorge Boosh did*. The fact is they don't care.