I first wrote about Marilyn Hartman, also known as the “serial stowaway,” in 2014. At this point she has been found trespassing at airports dozens of times. Often she has successfully managed to get past security and even board flights without tickets, which says a lot about our (lack of) security.
Over the years details have emerged about her, and it’s a really sad story. She’s a homeless woman who doesn’t seem to have any family. She claims she goes to airports because she feels safest there, though at the same time she also seems to make a game of trying to get through security. Clearly she has some mental issues as well, and she has refused treatment for that. I don’t know what the solution is, but clearly the system is failing her.
A couple of weeks ago Hartman managed to board a Chicago to London flight on British Airways. She slipped past security and avoided a busy gate agent, and made it all the way to London before she was sent back, due to her lack of a passport. Apparently she had been roaming O’Hare Airport for a couple of days prior to that.
Hartman was put back in jail yesterday, just three days after she was issued a warning to stay away from O’Hare and Midway Airports. According to the Chicago Sun Times:
The 66-year-old Grayslake woman was spotted shortly after midnight in an area of the airport that services privately owned planes, Cook County prosecutors said. When she refused to leave, employees called police. She left before officers arrived.
Authorities found Hartman at 1:35 a.m. in the lower level of Terminal 3 and arrested her, prosecutors said. She was ordered held without bail for violating the terms of her bond.
“She is in great need of mental health services and support,” said Cara Smith, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart’s chief policy adviser.
I think the policy advisor to the Cook County Sheriff is spot on:
“She is in great need of mental health services and support,” said Cara Smith, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart’s chief policy adviser.
Staff from the sheriff’s, state’s attorney’s and public defender’s offices will be in touch Monday to brainstorm on producing a “holistic plan” to help Hartman, Smith said.
“Just having a revolving door at the jail and O’Hare and Midway seems ridiculous, so we have to find some way to interrupt that and get her on a good path… I don’t suggest it will be easy, but there has to be some solution here,” Smith said.
Smith summed up Hartman’s very candid assessment of how she’s been able to bamboozle her way through airports: “She said: ‘I’m an old white lady. Nobody stops me.’”
What an unfortunate situation…
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