A former flight attendant accused of posing as a pilot and working airline employee fooled three U.S. carriers into giving him hundreds of free tickets over a span of four years, federal authorities say. But precisely how he is alleged to have done it — and why the airlines wouldn’t have caught on sooner — has industry insiders scratching their heads.

Dallas Pokornik, 33, of Toronto, was arrested in Panama after being indicted on wire fraud charges in federal court in Hawaii last October. He pleaded not guilty Tuesday following his extradition to the United States. His federal public defender declined to discuss the case.

According to court documents, Pokornik was a flight attendant for a Toronto-based airline from 2017 to 2019, then used fraudulent employee identification from that carrier to obtain tickets reserved for pilots and flight attendants on three other airlines. Court documents contained no explanation of why, in an industry focused on flight and airport safety, the airlines didn’t recognize the credentials as invalid.

The indictment did not identify any of the airlines involved but said the U.S. carriers are based in Honolulu, Chicago and Fort Worth, Texas. A spokesperson for Hawaiian Airlines said Wednesday the company does not comment on litigation. Representatives for United Airlines and American Airlines did not immediately respond to emails from The Associated Press.

One Canadian carrier based in Toronto, Porter Airlines, said in an emailed statement it was “unable to verify any information related to this story.” Air Canada, which is based in Montreal but has a major hub in Toronto, said it had no record of Pokornik working there.

Allegations surprise industry experts

John Cox, a retired pilot who runs an aviation safety firm in St. Petersburg, Florida, called the allegations surprising, considering the cross-checking that airlines are able to do to verify the employment of a crew member seeking to fly on another airline.

Airlines generally rely on databases of active airline employees maintained on third-party websites to check whether someone is actually an employee.

“The only thing I can think is that they did not show him as no longer employed by the airline,” Cox said in a phone interview Wednesday. “Consequently when the checks were made at the gate, he showed up as a valid employee.”

Passenger airlines typically offer such free or steeply discounted standby seats, when available, to their own crew members or those of other carriers — a courtesy that makes the whole industry function better, by getting crew members where they need to go. Employees can also use the perk for their immediate families when flying for leisure. Sometimes employees might sit in one of the “jump seats” with shoulder harnesses in the cockpit or in the cabin, but federal rules prohibit the cockpit jump seats from being used for leisure travel.

How the screening usually works

Crew members who need to travel to another city for work go through airport security by scanning a “known crew member” card linked to a database that has their photo, said Bruce Rodger, an airline pilot who owns an aviation consulting firm. They also present an employee badge and government-issued identification.

Using the known crew member process for leisure travel isn’t allowed, he said.

For leisure travel, crew members can purchase discounted standby tickets or request a jump seat. With a standby ticket, a crew member reaches the gates via normal airport security screening. It’s possible to have a standby ticket but request a jump seat, which allows the employee to fly for free.

The plane’s captain must approve who rides in the cockpit jump seats. Often that’s a licensed pilot but Federal Aviation Administration regulations also allow for others with official reasons to be there like a Defense Department evaluator, an air traffic controller observing, a crew member or a representative of the manufacturer.

In 2023, an off-duty airline pilot riding in the cockpit of a Horizon Air flight said “I’m not OK” just before trying to cut the engines midflight. That pilot, Joseph Emerson, later told police he had been struggling with depression. A federal judge sentenced that man to time served last November.

Pokornik asked to ride in the cockpit, prosecutors say

U.S. prosecutors said Tuesday that Pokornik requested to sit in the cockpit’s jump seat — typically reserved for off-duty pilots. It was not clear from court documents whether he ever actually rode in a plane’s cockpit, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Honolulu declined to say.

Years ago, the airline industry tightened up the standards for the flight benefits employees receive after the famous case of Frank Abagnale, whose exaggerated 1980 memoir, “Catch Me If You Can,” described posing as a pilot to fly for free, among other cons. His story gained additional fame when Steven Spielberg made it into a movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio in 2002.

Additional restrictions on who can get aboard a plane and inside a cockpit were imposed by the airlines and FAA after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

AP transportation writer Josh Funk contributed to this report from Omaha, Nebraska.