The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said it has seized “hundreds of prohibited items” recently at a Pennsylvania airport, where federal prosecutors say a man admitted to packing explosives in a suitcase checked for a commercial flight.
A TSA spokeswoman posted images to Twitter showing folding knives disguised as keys, a hammer, wrenches, screwdrivers and other blades taken away from the luggage of passengers at Lehigh Valley International Airport.
“A few examples of the hundreds of prohibited items that @TSA officers have stopped at the security checkpoint recently at [Lehigh],” she wrote.
Another photo showed a “knuckle knife (knife is folded into the knuckles), a folding knife and a martial arts throwing star” the spokeswoman said was found inside one passenger’s carry-on bag at the nearby Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport.
FBI agents arrested Marc Muffley, 40, of Lansford, earlier this month after he allegedly packed explosive materials, fuses and a lighter in a suitcase that was checked for an Allegiant Airlines flight departing Lehigh Valley International Airport on Feb. 27.
In court documents, federal prosecutors say Muffley admitted to placing the items in a suitcase, according to The Associated Press.
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Muffley is now being held without bail after a judge deemed him to be a flight risk and danger to the community.
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“The danger he created… is simply astonishing,” Assistant United States Attorney Sherri Stephan said at a court hearing last week, according to the AP. “The fact TSA was able to immediately locate this device and prevent it from being placed on an airplane is to their credit.”
Muffley has been charged with possessing an explosive in an airport and possessing or attempting to place an explosive or incendiary device on an aircraft.