Passenger claims Delta Air Lines cleaning crew member stole his laptop after he left it on plane

A Delta Air Lines passenger used his Find My iPhone app to track down his missing laptop. (Photo: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
A Delta Air Lines passenger used his Find My iPhone app to track down his missing laptop. (Photo: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

A Delta Air Lines passenger claims that the laptop he left on a flight was stolen by a member of a subcontracted cleaning crew.

“I was not hopeful. I was not expecting to actually get it,” Robert, who did not want to reveal his last name, told local Atlanta news station WSB-TV. “I called Delta, tried to get them to track it down. They just put me through to lost and found, and I left a voicemail.”

According to the outlet, the passenger used the Find My iPhone application on his phone and was able to locate his laptop in Hapeville, Ga., just 10 minutes from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, which his plane had flown into last Thursday.

A reporter for WSB-TV was able to obtain the police report from the Hapeville Police Department. The report showed that the person who lived at the location where the laptop was last tracked admitted to cleaning airplanes at the Atlanta airport for a living, taking the device and selling it for $500, the outlet reported. Robert said the experience was even worse because his children’s Christmas wish list was on the computer.

Detectives with the police department persuaded the man to contact the buyer and return the money in exchange for the laptop. The computer was eventually returned to Robert.

“Probably a lot of people after a long day of travel forget phones, laptops, whatever — and the fact that it can be so brazenly taken right out of an airport is frustrating and I think a little bit scary in the bigger picture,” Robert said.

According to WSB-TV, Delta Air Lines is looking into the incident; however, it informed the news outlet that it subcontracts cleaning crews and that the person who took the laptop is likely not a Delta employee.

Delta Air Lines did not immediately respond to Yahoo Lifestyle’s requests for comment.

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