These diamonds were being shipped, they weren't accompanying a passenger (acc. to the story). Also carrying objects that are worth more than $10,000 in an airport could result in an immediate forfeiture of those assets, which would itself result in many, many months of waiting before the goods can be recovered by their owner IF they can be recovered at all.

Frankly I think that if you need to ship stuff between Switzerland and Brazil -- or indeed any two countries that aren't the USA -- you should avoid a US stopover like the plague.

See: History; Jewish exodus from pre-War Europe. How did so many Jews end up in the diamond business?

I am not one for stealing, which is always wrong be it downloading movies to take posessions out of a suitcase but wtf? Had they not found the diamonds I would have thought this was some sort of insurance scam. I mean, what sort of person puts that in the checked luggage. People who fly all know you don't even put your mp3 player in your checked stuff let alone diamonds. Egads people are idiots.

At any rate, if I ever need to ship $250k worth of diamonds by any means less than armored guard, it's going into an odor-proof bag within a box labeled "veterinary stool samples" and containing a non-veterinary sample.

JFK is a great airport...for a 3rd world country. Seriously I avoid that place like the plague.

@noasalira: Yep. I've never done it myself, but starter pistols are cheap and if you google around a bit you should come across blogs of people who do this regularly.

@kimsama: The problem there is "hell no", the only place in the US that the railways make money is in the North East and we're rammed up the behind enough for the privilage. Here in the US we ::used:: to have a better air travel buisness, now, I'm not so sure.

But then again, Hethrow looses more baggage then any other air port in the world (which some of my exes had that ability ::rim shot::), now stolen luggage is another story, I can live with that, at least it wasnt incompitence.

250k in diamonds so where is the armored tranport?
I guess you cant buy intelligence.

@whatthegeek: I so agree...who is watching these people to prevent them from placing something IN one's luggage?

@rawsteak: Nope, you are correct, if you declare a firearm in your luggage, your luggage will be treated like royalty. Even if its a starter pistol.

Gee, bail for possession of pot or attempted car theft is higher than that!

Except diamonds have no intrinzic value...

@ClayS:

However.... I wonder if you would have to officially declare them since they are so valuable & very easy to smuggle. I know that of you plan on taking over $10,000 in cash out of the country via an airline that you have to declare it.

If I were to smuggle a lot of money out of the country, I'd convert them to diamonds & then carry them on my person when boarding a airliner.

Diamonds just might be something you would want to carry on your person or pack into a carryon bag.

Also: is there some reason we can't have video surveillance of the baggage areas? Or do we and it's just not implemented correctly? Because, like, there are video cameras watching the cashiers at the effing Gap, and I'm pretty sure they don't handle $250k in diamonds.

@whatthegeek: Right on, I wish that the U.S. had a decent rail infrastructure like other first world countries. I'd go 100% if I could.

Ya know what I really like? Trains. I've never had to take off my shoes to get on a train. I've never had my luggage rifled through by train station security. I've never heard of a baby getting put on the "No Ride" list because they share a name with a suspected terrorist.

You'd think that if a business was going to ship something that is extremely valuable (gold bars, diamonds etc. etc..) that they would be shipped via an EXTREMELY trusted company that specializes in this kind of thing.

You dont hire some regular schlub off the street as a bodyguard.... you hire a professional who is trusted to know what he's doing & trained specifically for that purpose. Why then hire a regular shipper to ship valuables?

Question... why were baggage handlers even given access to a cargo hold that has such extremely valuable cargo? Just doesnt seem like a smart thing to do.

I assume this is a business (that owned the jewels) & not some idiot passenger who packed their jewelry into a checked luggage.

@gitemstevedave: You mean those guys that wear black and white striped jumpsuits?