PRETORY? OR PREDATORY?:

Killer was hired as Air France guard (Paul Webster, December 31, 2003, The Guardian)

The company put in charge of security for Air France flights employed a convicted murderer and a number of others with serious criminal records, it emerged yesterday.

The background of the guards was disclosed in a Paris court during a hearing to wind up the company, Pretory, which had been operating security on the French airline for more than two years but went into bankruptcy after tax fraud allegations.

The revelation of its lax recruiting methods coincided with the disclosure that armed French police have been flying with Air France to the US since December 23. [...]

Four days after the terror attacks in the US on September 11 2001 Air France was one of the first networks to announce that passengers would be accompanied by "specially trained agents".

But the tribunal which ordered the company's liquidation heard that, in a rush to recruit guards, it had taken on disco bouncers, dog handlers, nightwatchmen, and other staff with little or no experience of arms or safety procedures.

At one time 200 guards were employed on flights.

An investigation was eventually started last April, when the police looked into the background of 140 agents, the most qualified of whom were former soldiers.

As a result of a search of criminal records more than 30 agents were grounded as a potential security risk.

The police also looked into the record of Pretory's sub-contractors.

This led to unconfirmed reports that some guards had been sent for arms training courses in Middle Eastern countries suspected of harbouring terrorists.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 31, 2003 8:35 PM