POLICE are hunting for an Alton man convicted of falsifying a pilot's licence to fly commercial aircraft into Gatwick.

The conman, who faked his qualifications to get a job flying holiday makers to the UK, is on the run after failing to appear before the courts for sentencing.

Michael Fay, 59, a US national who settled in Alton, worked fraudulently as a commercial airline pilot, flying passengers into Gatwick Airport without the proper licence and medical documentation on eight occasions.

Police were alerted to Fay's scam when another pilot became suspicious while chatting to him on an internet forum.

He had been operating Airbus A320 aircraft for eight months on behalf of Libyan company Afriqiyah Airways at the time of his arrest on February 3, 2011, having forged his pilot's licence and medical certificates. The former US Air Force pilot was sentenced in absentia to three years in prison at Winchester Crown Court on Friday, May 3, for fraud.

Fay is believed to have fled the UK and may be seeking work as a pilot or flying instructor elsewhere in the world.

For full story, see this week's Alton Herald.