Catch him if you can.
A former flight attendant posed as a commercial pilot to score hundreds of free flights in a con similar to those by “Catch Me If You Can” crook Frank Abagnale.
Toronto-born Dallas Pokornik, 34, copped to fraud charges Thursday as he admitted to using a “fictitious” ID card to receive “travel benefits, including airline tickets that are reserved for pilots” between January 2020 and October 2024, according to his plea agreement seen by CBC.
He even admitted once requesting to sit in a cockpit’s jump seat despite not holding a license.
Pokornik, a former flight attendant for an unnamed Toronto-based airline between July 2017 and October 2019, enjoyed at least 200 flights with US carriers and boasted about his trips online, CP24 reported.
His scheme wasn’t too dissimilar to that of Abagnale, who posed as Pan Am pilot when he was 16 and forged a license to score free flights. He was played by Leonardo DiCaprio in the 2002 Steven Spielberg film based on Abagnale’s 1980 autobiography, “Catch Me If You Can.”
Pokornik was busted when a staffer of a US carrier “took a picture of the forged badge” and sent the image to his ex-employer.
The badge had “an expiration date in the year 2027,” according to the plea agreement, which led airline staffers to believe the ID was fake, given the timeframe.
Pokornik was arrested in Panama after being indicted on Oct. 2 last year on wire fraud charges.
He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted, prosecutors said.
“This individual took advantage of travel security protocols for his own benefit, and he will now face the consequences of his actions,” CJ Ammons, Homeland Security investigations acting special agent in charge, said, welcoming the plea.
Ken Sorenson, US Attorney for the District of Hawaii, thanked those who helped “hold this fraudster accountable.”
“Travel security protocols help keep our citizens and visitors safe, and anyone who breaches those protocols should expect to be brought to justice,” Sorenson said.
Pokornik’s sentencing is set to take place on Dec. 8 and he has also agreed to pay costs to the airlines, based in Chicago, Honolulu and Fort Worth.
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