Former LAX Cargo Handler Gets 1 Year in Prison for Stealing Gold Bars From Shipment
Marlon Moody, a former employee at cargo handling company Alliance Ground International, was sentenced to one year in prison for stealing four gold bars that were being shipped from Australia to New York, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California announced. In April 2020, employees of Alliance, which provides ground handling services at Los Angeles International Airport, were tasked with offloading and securing a shipment of gold bars that were stopping in L.A. en route to New York. The shipment -- a collection of 2,000 gold bars each valued at around $56,000 --- arrived via Singapore Airlines at the direction of a Canadian bank.
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An inventory conducted after the shipment was unloaded discovered that one box with 25 gold bars was missing. Moody pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit theft of an interstate or foreign shipment. He found the missing box near the Singapore Airlines cargo warehouse the morning after the plane landed, placed the box on a belt loader and drove the vehicle to a nearby location where he took four of the bars. Shortly after, co-defendant Brian Benson picked up Moody in a company van. The pair later met in a nearby parking lot, where Moody gave Benson one of the bars. Moody gave one of his three bars to a relative and buried the other two in his backyard, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
Moody also was ordered to pay a $7,500 fine. “[Moody] conspired to steal and actually stole $224,000 worth of gold and kept $112,000 worth for himself,” a sentencing memorandum said. “As an AGI employee, defendant was entrusted with handling cargo shipments at LAX and granted access to certain sections of the airport. [Moody] squandered that trust by stealing from those who relied on him to handle their property.”