LAX passengers arrested over gun, marijuana in luggage

latimes.com 11/10

Passengers were arrested at Los Angeles International Airport in two separate incidents Wednesday after security officials found a gun in one passenger’s carry-on bag and two large bags of marijuana in another passenger’s checked bags.

Transportation Security Administration officers found a .45-caliber handgun along with two loaded magazines with eight rounds inside a carry-on bag as the passenger went through security screening in Terminal 1 on Wednesday afternoon.

The passenger, who was bound for Tucson on Southwest Airlines Flight 2894, told officers he forgot the weapon was in his bag, officials said. He was arrested on suspicion of possession of a concealed firearm without a permit, and police confiscated the gun and ammunition.

That evening, TSA officers found two packages of marijuana in Christmas wrap, weighing about 50 and 70 pounds each, inside checked baggage. Officers searched the bags manually after the screening equipment was unable to determine what was inside them.

The owner of the bags, who was waiting to board Continental Airlines Flight 1579 to Cleveland, was arrested.