Passenger used suspected fake boarding pass to sneak onto United flight, forcing plane back to gate, authorities say

By Sneha Dhandapani, CNN

A man was found hiding in a United Airlines plane’s bathroom last month after police say he slipped past TSA and gate agents using what appeared to be a fake boarding pass, according to Texas authorities. It wasn’t the first time someone stowed away on a flight this year.

Abdulrahman Oriyomi, 25, was charged with felony impairing or interrupting operation of a critical infrastructure facility last week and was booked into jail in Harris County, Texas, on Friday, according to court records. CNN has reached out to Oriyomi’s attorney.

Once he successfully boarded the United Airlines plane at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Oriyomi tried to sit in an empty aisle seat, according to a criminal complaint. A woman seated nearby told investigators he acted like he wasn’t sure if it was his seat, stood back up and went to one of the plane’s restrooms. When he returned 15 minutes later, other passengers were seated there, police say the passenger told them. Oriyomi then went to another bathroom on the plane, the complaint alleges.

When the plane began to pull away from the gate, the passenger alerted flight attendants that someone was in the restroom. A flight attendant knocked on the restroom door, found Oriyomi, and then told him to return to his seat, according to the complaint.

A few minutes later, the flight attendant found Oriyomi in another restroom. At this point, the attendant asked Oriyomi for his name, to which he said his name was Mr. Lopez, the complaint said.

Oriyomi tried to find an open seat, but the plane was full. Unsuccessful, he asked attendants if he could sit in the plane’s “jump seat,” the complaint said.

Flight attendants then checked the manifest, didn’t see a Mr. Lopez registered for the flight and realized Oriyomi was an unauthorized passenger, according to the complaint. They notified the flight crew and captain, and the plane then returned to the gate.

CNN has reached out to the Houston Police Department for comment. United Airlines referred CNN to the Houston Police Department. Houston Airports referred CNN to TSA for security screening information, adding “all security screening measures are implemented by federal and local authorities.”

The TSA told CNN in a statement “the individual in question presented a valid boarding pass at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. The individual did go through standard screening and did not possess any prohibited items.”

How authorities say he got past airport security

Before boarding the flight from Houston to Los Angeles, authorities allege Oriyomi had managed to slip through TSA security checkpoints and past United gate agents.

Oriyomi was first seen approaching a checkpoint booth at Bush Airport at about 5:45 a.m. on May 18, according to surveillance cameras, authorities alleged in the complaint. Oriyomi was seen “staring at his phone and delaying speaking to a TSA agent,” court documents say. After “several moments and possible difficulty with his boarding pass” with one agent, Oriyomi was escorted to another TSA booth. There, Oriyomi’s picture was taken, and he was allowed to go through security into the terminal, according to the complaint.

An hour later, Oriyomi got in line at gate E16, waiting to board a plane from Houston to Los Angeles, the complaint says. He was turned away from that gate after unsuccessfully scanning a boarding pass multiple times and “appearing to have a disagreement with United staff for several minutes,” the complaint said.

Less than two hours after he was first turned away, Oriyomi approached gate D4, where he “awkwardly paces and stands in the area,” court documents say. At 9:08 a.m., he got in line to board flight number 469, scheduled to depart Houston at 9:45 a.m. and arrive in Los Angeles at 11:28 a.m.

Oriyomi then approached the United desk, intentionally waiting for the employees to be preoccupied with other passengers, court documents say.

“(Oriyomi) pretends he is going to show his boarding pass, walks past the United employees, then proceeds down the jetway while the two other United employees are still distracted,” the complaint says.

After Oriyomi was found on the plane and it returned to the gate, Houston Police, Houston Police’s Explosive Detection K-9 Unit, the FBI, city airport services and TSA were dispatched to the scene. Once the passengers deboarded, the K-9 unit checked the plane for explosives, according to the complaint.

Investigators at the scene spoke to United’s customer service, which found a reservation for Oriyomi, court documents say. He had tried to buy a ticket for a flight from Houston to Los Angeles, but United Airlines had canceled Oriyomi’s reservation due to no payment, authorities said.

Oriyomi was then read a trespass warning at the airport. When he realized he wasn’t going to jail, Oriyomi began recording law enforcement and “causing a scene,” court records say. He only left the airport after being warned he would go to jail, according to the complaint.

Houston Police, the FBI and airport services “were tied up on this significant event for over an hour and a half,” the complaint alleged. The United flight was delayed by about three hours.

Investigators later examined a picture of the boarding pass authorities say Oriyomi had shown airport staff and on this basis, believed the pass to be fake, as it was “missing key information and the QR code appeared to be forged,” according to the complaint.

Oriyomi is being held on a $15,000 bond and is due in court on Monday.

Past stowaway cases raise security concerns

Situations like this one, while uncommon, sound alarms about lapses in aviation security, experts say. The Federal Aviation Administration doesn’t track exactly how often these stowaway situations occur.

One such incident occurred on Christmas Eve in 2024, when stowaway Shemaiah Patrice Small slipped past TSA and a gate agent before she was discovered in someone else’s seat on the Delta Airlines aircraft, CNN reported.

During Thanksgiving week 2024, prosecutors say Svetlana Dali snuck onto a Delta flight from New York to France. She made it from John F. Kennedy International Airport to Paris before she was arrested. Again in February 2026, Dali boarded a United flight from Newark Airport to Milan, Italy, without a ticket or passport, which led to another arrest, a law enforcement source told CNN at the time.

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