Unruly passenger ‘wanted to destroy everything’

Associated Press

MIAMI — An airline passenger who was subdued with an ax after he kicked in the bottom of a cockpit door and tried to wriggle through said later that he had "wanted to destroy everything," according to the FBI.

The disclosure came on a day marked by problems with other airline passengers. Also, the FBI announced progress in the so-called shoe bombing case.

Pablo Moreira Mosca, a 29-year-old bank employee from Uruguay, was arrested after the Thursday cockpit incident on a United Airlines flight bound from Miami to Buenos Aires with 157 people aboard.

Argentine authorities said they were investigating whether he was mentally ill or under the influence of drugs. U.S. officials said he did not appear to be drunk and was not armed, and that it did not appear to be a terrorist act.

"His brother said he often becomes upset when there is turbulence, and passengers told us he had been drinking a lot on the plane. But when I asked him about it, he told me he had one whiskey prior to getting on the plane," said Argentine air force spokesman Jorge Reta.

Moreira was sent back to the United States and appeared in federal court Friday with a bruise under his right eye. He was held without bail on a charge of interfering with a flight crew, which carries up to 20 years in prison.

Also Friday, a small jet bound for New York was diverted to Cleveland on Friday to get rid of a 35-year-old French passenger that authorities say angrily refused to put out his cigarette. Also, authorities searched a Delta Air Lines jet at Hartsfield Atlanta International Airport on Friday after a bomb threat; nothing was found.

Meanwhile, the FBI is trying to determine the importance of a human hair and an unidentified hand print found in December in explosive devices hidden in the shoes of a passenger aboard an American Airlines flight, law enforcement sources said.

Investigators so far have not identified whose hair and hand print they have found or whether that person might have been involved in construction of the explosive devices, people familiar with the case said Friday. They said the devices are sophisticated and potentially deadly.

A grand jury last month indicted the passenger, Richard Reid, 28, who carried a British passport, on charges of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction, attempted murder, placing a bomb inside an aircraft and related charges.

The indictment also accused Reid of receiving training from al-Qaida terrorists in Afghanistan.

Citing unidentified European law enforcement sources, CNN said a prepaid telephone card found when Reid was arrested had been used to place a call to a cellular phone found in the Brussels apartment of a suspected al-Qaida terrorist.