ATLANTA — Rock guitarist Rick Derringer told a federal air marshal that he keeps his gun with him on commercial airline flights 30 to 50 times a year, and the only time he was detained was last month at Atlanta’s airport near the end of a trip to Mexico, authorities said.
Found with a loaded gun in his carry-on bag after stepping off a Delta Air Lines flight from Cancun, Mexico, he now faces a criminal charge in Atlanta, court records show.
Derringer, 69, told the air marshal that having his gun with him had never posed a problem until this year, when it was found at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, a court affidavit states.
“Derringer explained that he was aware that his pistol was in his carry-on bag but he thought that it was acceptable to carry a pistol on an airplane,” according to the complaint filed this week in U.S. District Court in Atlanta.
Derringer, whose music topped the charts in the 1960s and has been used in pro wrestling and presidential politics more recently, was charged with unlawfully entering the Atlanta airport’s secure area Jan. 9.
Air passengers are allowed to bring guns as checked baggage only. The unloaded firearms must be in locked, hard-sided containers that are declared to the airline when checked, according to the TSA. Ammunition also is prohibited in carry-on bags.
The Kel-Tec pistol with six rounds of ammunition was found during a search of Derringer’s bag after his flight landed in Atlanta, authorities said. Since he arrived on an international flight, he was being re-checked by security to continue on to Sarasota, Fla., when the weapon was found, court records indicate.
A separate gun clip with bullets in Derringer’s bag — not the pistol itself — aroused suspicions as it passed through an X-ray machine, court records show. The pistol loaded with six rounds and the separate gun clip with six more rounds were found in a physical search of the bag, court records show.
He thought he was permitted to have the gun because he has a license to carry one, his manager, Kenn Moutenot said in a statement to the Associated Press.
On Jan. 5, Derringer was processed through the Sarasota airport by its screeners and then flew to Atlanta and on to Cancun, records indicate.
“The person who missed this in the screening was terminated,” said Rick Piccolo, president and CEO of Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport. In 2015, some U.S. Congress members said fake weapons, explosives and other contraband went unnoticed in 67 out of 70 tries — about 96 percent of the time — at TSA airport checkpoints.
