Caught Boarding a Plane with a Photo of Another Passenger's Ticket, This Man Was Arrested and Becomes a Federal Prisoner

Check in Delta Air Lines facility. (Wikimedia Commons/DeltaNewsHub)

JAKARTA - A Texas, United States man was arrested after boarding a Delta Air Lines plane in Salt Lake City on Sunday last week without a ticket, after using a photo he took of another passenger's boarding pass when they were not looking, according to court documents.

Wicliff Yves Fleurizard, 26, faces charges of sneaking onto an airplane, according to a complaint filed in U.S. district court in Utah on Monday.

Before passengers boarded at Salt Lake City International Airport, security footage showed Fleurizard taking cellphone photos and boarding passes of several passengers when they weren't looking, then using his own cellphone to board a flight to Austin, Texas, the complaint alleges.

Once on the plane, Fleurizard went to the toilet at the front of the plane and spent “a significant amount of time” there while other passengers boarded the plane, the complaint said.

"After boarding was complete and just before the plane door closed, Fleurizard came out of the front toilet and walked to the back of the plane and entered the back toilet," said the complaint, reported by CNN, March 21.

When she came out of the bathroom, a flight attendant realized there were no seats available and approached Fleurizard to help her, according to the complaint, which notes the plane had backed away from the gate and began taxiing down the runway.

Fleurizard told the flight attendant that his seat was 21F. But when the flight crew verified, the person who bought a ticket for that seat was already sitting there, the complaint said.

After flight attendants obtained Fleurizard's real name and determined he did not have a ticket or booking reservation, the plane returned to the gate and he was turned over to law enforcement, the complaint said.

Fleurizard told police he was in Park City, Utah, for snow play and "had to get home to see his family," the document states.

He said he had booked a Southwest Airlines flight on Sunday, but the flight was full and he was rescheduled on a later flight, according to the complaint.

“Fleurizard admitted he had made a mistake and was just trying to get home,” the complaint said.

He is being held at the Salt Lake County Metro Jail on federal prisoner status, police told CNN.