Even though marijuana is legal in many states, it remains against federal law. You can’t take it on interstate flights. Still, some people apparently pack their pot in checked luggage. And United Airlines baggage handlers steal it.

• They’ve been doing this for years.

• United apparently lets their baggage handlers have trash bags, and walk straight from duty out with the bags to their cars.

A group of United Airlines employees stole marijuana from checked luggage at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) for years, according to federal prosecutors. The Justice Department charged two baggage handlers on June 9 with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance for their role in the alleged scheme.

The employees, Joel Lamont Dunn and Adrian Webb, allegedly enlisted at least three other airport workers to help them snatch the cannabis, load it into 15-20 gallon trash bags and then put it in their personal vehicles, according to court filings.

An informant who was part of the project was making $10,000 per week helping to steal the pot from passenger luggage. Since this is San Francisco, the group was “robbed at gunpoint” in the employee parking lot. They reported the robbery, failing to remember their Truman Capote that “The problem with living outside the law is that you no longer have its protection.”

This is better than baggage handlers stealing computers from rural school kids but seems highly problematic since the scheme went on for three years and, it would appear, lax airline procedures enabled it.