Airport technician held over smuggling of hundreds of latest iPhones into Vietnam

Vietnamese police have arrested two men and a woman for smuggling hundreds of Apple iPhones into the country, with one of the suspects using his job as an aircraft technician to avoid customs inspection, local media reported on Monday. Le Van Ngoc, 43, and Nguyen Anh Tuan, 33, were arrested, with Ngoc’s wife, 29, also charged with acting as an accomplice to assist the smuggling, the police said on Sunday. Tuan was arrested at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City, after he flew in from Thailand with 12 new iPhone 14 Pro Max devices that were not declared to customs officials, the police said. Investigations revealed that he had been colluding with Ngoc, a technician in charge of aircraft maintenance with the Vietnam Airlines Engineering Company, to smuggle more than 600 similar phones worth 20b dong (S$1.12m) over an undisclosed period of time. Ngoc would let Tuan know his work roster at the airport, information that Tuan would use to book flights from Thailand to the Vietnamese city. Upon touching down at the airport, Tuan would hand a batch of phones bought from Thailand to the aircraft technician, who would hide it in his tool bag while he performed his plane maintenance duties.<br/>