Former Charlotte baggage handler accused of stealing from luggage

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Police in Charlotte have signed a warrant accusing a former baggage handler at Charlotte Douglas Airport with larceny, saying he stole from a passenger’s checked luggage.

Detectives say Marlow Hayes admitted taking an LG tablet from a bag checked on a Frontier Airlines flight to Orlando in June.

“You check your luggage and you expect the people that are behind the counter to be honest. You expect the people that are working for the airline to be honest,” the woman who owns the tablet told Eyewitness News.

The woman reported the theft to police and said that her husband had used GPS to track the tablet to a home off West Boulevard. A police search warrant says the resident of that home told police he had bought the tablet from a regular customer at his barbershop for $40, who police later identified as Hayes.

According to the warrant, a detective confronted Hayes about the theft and he admitted taking it.

Police say they are investigating a total of seven reports of items taken from luggage on Frontier Airlines flights within the last month, five of them while Hayes on was on duty as a baggage handler for the airline.

Eyewitness News was not able to reach Hayes on Friday, but police say he worked for a company called Jet Stream Ground Services that contracts with Frontier to provide baggage services. A manager at Jet Stream told Eyewitness News Friday that Hayes no longer works there.

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