An Air France stewardess is facing ten years in prison after pleading guilty to stealing from business class passengers whilst they slept on long-haul flights.

The 47-year-old Air France employee was eventually caught following a number of complaints about missing cash, credit cards and jewellery.

Investigators tallied her flight rota with the large number of crimes being reported.

A source close to the investigators told the Daily Mail: “It would all go missing on the routes she was working on.”

She knew that many of the passengers would fall asleep following a big meal and lots of alcohol.

“This is the time that she would start rifling through their property, helping herself to whatever she could find.”

Most took place on long-haul flights from France to the Far East. On one flight to Japan alone, five passengers complained about losing up to £3,700 in cash.

The unnamed stewardess is married with children and lives in the city of Rouen, north west of Paris.

She was finally arrested when she got off a Tokyo to Paris flight at 4.30am last Friday.

Colleagues had become suspicious of the defendant’s glitz lifestyle.

Though her salary was less than £40,000 a year, she drove to work in a top-of-the-range sports car and bought several upmarket apartments close to the airports where she worked.

The woman is currently in custody in Paris and is expected to appear before examining magistrates later this week.