The Fake Parts, People and PDFs That Duped the Aviation Industry

From his home office in a tranquil English village just outside London, Jose Alejandro Zamora Yrala spent years selling 60,000 jet-engine components with fabricated paperwork that trickled into every corner of the global aviation industry.

Working with a Spanish graphic designer and an employee of TAP Air Portugal, the part-time DJ doctored PDF certificates on his computer and duped the safety-obsessed aviation industry over the space of five years, according to court documents. The scandal led to a worldwide hunt for the falsified components on the most widely flown Airbus SE and Boeing Co. airliners and caused £40 million ($54 million) in damages.