British Detective Pleads Guilty to Stealing Thousands From LHR Airport Passengers

A former British detective is finding himself on the other side of the law after admitting to stealing up to $114,000 from flyers. Michael Harrington once served at London Heathrow Airport to make sure flyers didn’t carry a suspicious amount of cash during their travels. Now, authorities say he personally benefited from some of the seizures.

A former detective of Britain’s Metropolitan Police will spend the next four years in prison after pleading guilty to accusations that he stole from flyers who traveled with large amounts of cash. The Independent reports 46-year-old Detective Sergeant Michael Harrington admitted to 16 counts of theft, adding up to $114,000 from flyers at London Heathrow Airport (LHR).

According to the Crown Prosecution Service, Harrington was assigned to LHR to investigate passengers who carried suspicious amounts of cash. During his regular work, he would seize money suspected of being smuggled in connection to crime for investigation. If no evidence had pointed to a crime, the flyers should have received their cash back.

However, prosecutors say this was not the case. Authorities point to two episodes in particular where Harrington was involved. In the first, the detective stopped two people traveling to an overseas wedding before seizing their money. Another episode involved a flyer who did not speak English: Harrington was accused of taking their cash while denying the individual access to an interpreter.

Authorities were tipped to Harrington’s activities when flyers asked about getting their money back. Investigators claim that Harrington would falsify logs to say money was returned to the passengers, or that a lesser amount of cash was taken into evidence, returning some of the cash to the flyers and pocketing the rest. When Harrington was arrested in 2015, evidence bags used to transport the cash from the airport to his home were found.

The former officer pleaded guilty to all 16 charges of theft placed against him in court. At his scheduling hearing, a judge ruled that Harrington would spend the next four years and six months in prison for his crimes.

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