Police probe if woman faked link to crash victim for flights

BERLIN (AP) — German police are looking into whether a woman claimed to be a relative of a victim of last month’s Germanwings crash to get free flights to southern France.

Germanwings parent Lufthansa organized special flights for victims’ relatives after the March 24 crash, which killed all 150 people on board. The daily Halterner Zeitung, based in the town that lost 16 high school students and two teachers, reported Thursday that a woman flew to the region twice at Lufthansa’s expense after falsely claiming to be a cousin of one of the teachers.

Markus Tewes, a police spokesman in the town Hoexter, said police are investigating possible fraud and the woman will be questioned. Lufthansa said it’s looking into what appears to be a “regrettable isolated case,” but didn’t give details.