Similarly to June, I also had a lot of questions about the legal aspect of having a criminal casino on a plane. But I thought to myself: "I can finally use that transportation law class I took in law school".
Most of this is managed by the Tokyo Convention of 1963, which has been signed by 186 countries, including the United States and my home country of France. To summarise it, the State of registration of the aircraft is competent to exercise jurisdiction over offences and acts committed on board even in international air space. I would point out that it is illegal to buy a plane and not register it; this would fall under the jurisdiction of the country in which the sale happened. But if we assume that the plane is registered, it is actually fairly simple to determine the jurisdiction of a plane, and therefore none of these activities would escape the law just because they are in international air space. It would be a different story if this was not a money plane, but a money skydiving session (sequel?).
Fun fact, a way more complicated question is the citizenship of a baby born on board of a plane whilst flying in international air space. This actually depends on a lot of factors but in some cases, a baby could have a claim to U.S. citizenship if they were born in a plane within 12-nautical miles of the ground, the delimitation of international air space. In other cases, a baby could even become stateless, i.e. with no citizenship.
Who thinks transportation and international law is a blow-off class now, dad ?
