'Serial Stowaway' Arrested Again At O'Hare

CHICAGO, IL – A Grayslake woman who snuck on to a Chicago-to-London flight before she was later detained at Heathrow International Airport and sent back to the U.S. was arrested again early Sunday at O'Hare International Airport. Marilyn Hartman, who has been dubbed the "serial stowaway" for repeatedly slipping past security and catching flights for free, is behind bars again for violating a condition of her bond that specified the 66-year-old stay away from O'Hare International and Midway airports.

At about 1:30 a.m. on Sunday, police were called to an area of O'Hare for a report of a woman who was refusing to leave and was causing a disturbance, the Chicago Tribune reports. Authorities did not find the woman right away. But after searching O’Hare, they found Hartman in Terminal 3.

She was taken into custody and charged with criminal trespassing on state land and a violation of a bail bond.

On Sunday, she appeared in bond court where Judge Mike Clancy ordered she be held without bail for violating conditions of her previous bail, which was set in connection with her Jan. 15 flight to London, according to media reports.

During the incident earlier this month, O'Hare security cameras caught Hartman passing through airport security without a passport or boarding pass. She then boarded a flight to London's Heathrow International Airport, where she was detained by British Customs, police said.

Hartman was flown back to Chicago after she was denied entry to Great Britain, police said. She landed at O'Hare on Thursday, Jan. 18, and was taken into custody by Chicago police, according to authorities.

The recent incidents aren't the first times Hartman has had run-ins with the law trying to sneak aboard commercial airplanes. She was charged in similar incidents in Chicago and Jacksonville, Florida, in 2015, and West Coast authorities accused her of trying to stowaway on flights from San Francisco to Hawaii on six separate occasions in 2014.

Before this week's incident, Hartman's last attempt to sneak aboard a plane was in 2016 at O'Hare, according to the Tribune. She served jail time stemming from those charges and was staying in Near North Side mental health facility before her arrest, the report added.

During a teary interview with reporters following her August 2014 arrest in Phoenix, Hartman said she had been diagnosed with major depression and also, in rambling explanation, that she believed police were letting her be a plan stowaway so they could arrest her, ABC 7 reports. She was placed in treatment for mental disorders but stopped attending.

She also has said homelessness pushed her to take "desperate measures." And that she felt safer at airports than on the streets, according to ABC 7 Chicago.

Marilyn Hartman, 66 (Photo via Chicago Police Department)