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CITY NEWS
THE CHANDLER ARIZONAN | WWW.CHANDLERNEWS.COM | APRIL 18, 2021
New flight school comes to Chandler airport BY KEVIN REAGAN Arizonan Staff Writer
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handler Municipal Airport is welcoming a new flight school that will train the next generation of aspiring aviators. Sierra Charlie Aviation, a Scottsdalebased school, is opening another location in Chandler for students living in the East Valley. The company plans to bring a handful of airplanes down to Chandler for its first class of students and gradually expand its operations in the coming years. Luke Ormsby, Sierra’s marketing director, said Chandler seemed like the perfect location to add another flight school since the East Valley probably has many students uninterested in commuting to Phoenix or Scottsdale every day. “It’s going to be so crucial for those college students who maybe don’t like those bigger programs,” he said. “Now they’re going to have a home right next door.” Sierra Charlie trains students to work
Scott Campbell five years ago founded Sierra Charlie Aviation at Scottsdale Airpark and is now opening a second campus at the Chandler Municipal Airport, using a fleet of G1000 Cessna Skyhawks. (Courtesy of Sierra Charlie Aviation) for airlines by offering a customized curriculum intended to conform to the strengths and weaknesses of each pupil.
“We kind of service everyone and their needs,” Ormsby added. “We really train all different types of students, not just
one set type of student.” The school prides itself on its selective
see FLIGHT page 20
Chandler man pleads to extorting business BY KEVIN REAGAN Arizonan Staff Writer
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Chandler man has pleaded guilty in federal court to using his YouTube channel to threaten and extort a private business. Austin Steinbart, 30, was sentenced to time served after spending several months in custody following his arrest last year. The long-time Arizona resident, who has been associated with the controversial QAnon political movement, got caught up in an online firestorm last March after he used his social media presence to attack a business that wouldn’t heed to his demands. According to court records, Steinbart hacked into a California-based medical facility’s records and obtained private information on a number of celebrity patients. The defendant then posted a video on
Austin Steinbart, right, posed last year with Jake Angeli, a familiar face at pro-Trump rallies in Arizona and a purported QAnon conspiracy theorist who was arrested for his role in the Jan/. 6 insurrection at the nation’s Capitol. (Special to the Arizonan)
his YouTube channel, detailing his hacking operation to his 10,000 followers. Once the medical facility became aware of Steinbart’s video, they reached out and asked him to delete it. Steinbart refused and threatened to leak additional information. “You have no idea what patient data I possess or what my next move is,” Steinbard wrote the company. “All you know for certain is that I have thousands of highly-engaged followers ready to propagate any leaks far and wide across the global internet at a moment’s notice.” On March 19, 2020, FBI agents visited the defendant’s Chandler home and asked him to take down videos containing private information. He again refused. Two days later, Steinbart posted another video and directed his followers to contact a Connecticut-based data security company that had suspended Steinbart’s account for copyright and privacy
infringements, court records show. If the company did not restore access to his account, Steinbart warned he and his followers would “start flooding their phone lines and their email billing system” until the company could no longer conduct their day-to-day business. Steinbart additionally provided instructions to his YouTube followers on how to contact the company and what to say to them. The data company claims it received thousands of emails shortly after Steinbart posted his video. Steinbart posted more videos in the following days with new instructions on how to flood the company’s emergency tech support line, court records show. The attack campaign escalated to Steinbart sending a threatening message to the company’s CEO on Twitter, where he claimed to be running a mili-
see HARASS page 18