A former candidate for Clark County Sheriff and controversial owner of a local helicopter company that filed for bankruptcy last month was supposed to make his first appearence in federal bankruptcy court today.

Jerry Airola didn't attend the hearing, but hundreds of former Silver State students were there.


Close to 200 former students showed up at the Foley Federal Building, but the group was larger than expected so the bankruptcy hearing had to be moved to a larger room across the street at the George Federal Courthouse.

Students from Las Vegas and as far away as California and Washington state wanted to be here.

They are among the more than 2,000 students from Silver State who were shocked to learn their training was coming to an end and that Silver State Helicopters was filing for bankruptcy.

Jamie Antoni is from Las Vegas and took out a $70,000 loan to pay for the school. He was at the hearing to learn more about his options after Airola pulled the plug.

"I want to find out, get as much information as I can because there's a substantial amount of money involved from these individual people. Seventy grand a head. That's a lot of money. If it turns out we're expected to pay that money back, I want to find out where it went. Their claiming the money is all gone. Where did it all go?" said Antoni.

Many of these students have hired independent lawyers. They were also on hand, listening to what may happen after the hearing.


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