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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.