A 79-year-old woman was arrested at Fort Lauderdale International Airport on Tuesday when security screeners found an unloaded gun in her carry-on bag, sheriff’s officials said.
Margaret Anderson was planning to board a flight on Bahamas Air when an X-ray scanner revealed a small handgun inside the bag, and Broward Sheriff’s Office deputies took her and her luggage into custody, sheriff’s spokesman Jim Leljedal said in a news release.
Deputies found a single-shot Colt Derringer in a gun case built to resemble a hardcover book, with seven .22-caliber bullets in the case next to the weapon, the sheriff’s office said.
Anderson, of Bonita Springs, told deputies and reporters she knew the gun case contained a pistol, but had forgotten it was in the tote bag. She said she had put the gun in the bag when she recently moved and never removed it, the sheriff’s office said.
She was booked into Broward County Jail on a charge of carrying a concealed weapon and later released on $1,000 bond. If convicted, she faces up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.
“I’m awful sorry. I wouldn’t harm a soul,” Anderson said after her release.