By Donna Hopper
SooToday.com
Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Adam Dylan Leon has been sentenced in a federal court in St. Louis, Missouri to two years in prison for stealing a four-seat Cessna 172 to cross into U.S. airspace.

The 31-year-old Thunder Bay student pilot admitted to stealing the plane in April of this year using his student key card.

His attorney told the court that her client suffered from severe depression and hoped to die in a plane crash.

A seven-and-a-half-hour pursuit involving Leon, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection plane and two Wisconsin Air National Guard F-16 fighters resulted in the evacuation of the Wisconsin capitol in Madison.

Alerts were also issued for six Midwestern cities, including St. Louis.