Flight attendant Karina Parygina is reported to have confessed to taking the bag into a toilet and removing the cash on her way with it to the Lost and Found

A flight attendant faces ruin after she allegedly stole £5,500 in cash from a passenger.

A businessman arrived in Moscow on a Aeroflot flight from Antalya with a small bag containing almost $9,000 (£7,600) in American banknotes.

He left it on the plane and later retrieved it from Lost and Found at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport.

But the business class passenger Oleg Abara found that $6,450 (£5,445) was missing.

He complained to police who used airport spy cameras to track down the crew member for the Russian airline who carried the bag from the plane to Lost and Found.

Flight attendant Karina Parygina, 35, is reported to have confessed that on the way to Lost and Found she took the bag into a toilet and removed the cash.

She took the cash home and hid the bank notes in a linen closet, reported Ostorozhno Novosti.

Police retrieved the money and opened a criminal investigation for theft against Parygina.

If convicted she would lose her job at the Russian state airline.

The Mirror told in 2018 how British police denied boarding and searching a Russian plane at Heathrow Airport.

Russia claimed officers inspected the cabin of an Aeroflot Airbus A321 passenger liner after it touched down at the London-based airport.

It alleged that cops asked crew members to disembark the aircraft so they could carry out a search in their absence - but the captain refused to leave.

But the Metropolitan Police denied conducting a search of an Airbus at Heathrow.

The were told by the Foreign Office that customs officers had boarded a plane in London, but gave no further details.

HMRC said they were not dealing with the matter and the Home Office was leading the investigation.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova had earlier claimed: “The British authorities asked the Russian crew, including the captain, to leave the plane.

“The commander of the aircraft proposed the inspection to be conducted in his presence as he’s forbidden from leaving the plane in accordance with the regulations.

“At the moment, the police proceed with the search without releasing the commander from the cabin and preventing him from being present during the inspection."

She added: “The behaviour of the UK police clearly indicates the desire to conduct some kind of manipulations on board without witnesses.”

However, taking to Twitter, the Met Police said: "We are aware of a story circulating on social media. Please be advised that Metropolitan Police are not conducting a search of an Airbus inbound from Moscow at Heathrow."

The plane was said to have departed from Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport, before touching down at Heathrow several hours ago.

British officers reportedly approached crew members and 'demanded' that they leave the aircraft after passengers had already disembarked.

Speaking to Interfax, an 'informed' source claimed that cops did not give a reason for the inspection as they ordered the crew to leave the plane.

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