Indian-American lived in airport for 3 months due to COVID-19 fear, arrested

A 36yearold Indianorigin man who was too scared to fly due to the coronavirus pandemic and lived undetected for nearly three months in a secure area of Chicagos international airport has been arrested US authorities saidAditya Singh lives in a suburb of Los Angeles California was arrested on Saturday for living in a secure area at Chicagos OHare International Airport since October 19 the Chicago Tribune reported on SundaySingh has been charged with felony criminal trespass to a restricted area of an airport and misdemeanour theft the report saidProsecutors told a court that Singh arrived at OHare on a flight from Los Angeles on October 19 and allegedly has lived in the airports security zone ever since without detectionHe was arrested after two United Airlines staff asked him to produce his identification He showed them a badge but it reportedly belonged to an operations manager who reported it missing in OctoberHe reportedly found the staff badge in the airport and was scared to go home due to COVID Assistant State Attorney Kathleen Hagerty saidThe airline employees called 911 Police took Singh into custody on Saturday morning in Terminal 2 near Gate F12Aditya Singh managed to live on handouts from other passengers Hagerty told Cook County Judge Susana OrtizThe judge expressed surprise at the circumstances of the case the report saidSo if I understand you correctly youre telling me that an unauthorised nonemployee individual was allegedly living within a secure part of the OHare airport terminal from Oct 19 2020 to Jan 16 2021 and was not detected I want to understand you correctly Ortiz saidSingh lives in the Los Angeles suburb of Orange with roommates and does not have a criminal background according to Assistant Public Defender Courtney Smallwood She said Singh has a masters degree in hospitality and is unemployedSmallwood acknowledged the circumstances were unusual but noted the allegations were nonviolentIt was unclear what brought Singh to Chicago the report saidSingh has been barred from entering the airport if he is able to post the USD 1000 for bail He is due back in court on January 27The court finds these facts and circumstances quite shocking for the alleged period of time that this occurred the judge saidBeing in a secured part of the airport under a fake ID badge allegedly based upon the need for airports to be absolutely secure so that people feel safe to travel I do find those alleged actions do make him a danger to the community Ortiz saidThe Chicago Department of Aviation which oversees the citys airports said in a statement While this incident remains under investigation we have been able to determine that this gentleman did not pose a security risk to the airport or to the travelling publicThe US is the worstaffected country in the world with more than 23937000 COVID19 infections and 397000 deaths according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus tracker The US state of California is currently witnessing a surge in infectionsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever