Joint Airport Investigation Teams (JAITs) investigate serious and organised crime in the aviation sector.
The establishment of the JAITs in November 2005 created a specific investigations capacity targeting serious and organised crime in the aviation sector. The primary focuses of the JAITs is to proactively target serious and organised crime, focussing on trusted insiders (aviation employees), who exploit, or aim to exploit infrastructure and security vulnerabilities at the 10 major airports and through the broader aviation environment.
JAITs include investigators from the Australian Federal Police (AFP), Australian Customs and Border Protection Service and officers seconded from State and Territory police services.
The combination of skills and expertise from these agencies enables the AFP to provide a coordinated and comprehensive investigations capability in response to serious and organised crime at Australia's major airports.
JAITs are based at Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth airports, however are able to deploy to any of the 10 major Australian airports to undertake investigations.
Some of the offences which may be investigated by JAITs include:
- drug importation and trafficking
- money laundering
- threats to aviation security
- theft within the air steam
- receiving stolen property.