Conspiracy theorists are speculating about wild CIA plots after an obscure cargo carrier based in Estero on Florida’s west coast was impounded Feb. 14 in Zimbabwe carrying the dead body of an alleged stowaway and 67 tons of cash bound for South Africa, BrowardPalmBeachNewTimes reported.

The plane, the body and cash belonging to the South African Reserve Bank have since been released to South African authorities but the identity of the dead man found on board remain a mystery.

Operated by Western Global Airlines, the unmarked cargo plane was impounded during refueling after workers at Harare International Airport noticed blood dripping from the plane.

The stowaway may have been dead for four days when his body was discovered, NewsdzeZimbabwe reported. Postmortem results showed he died of asphyxia (lack of oxygen), according to police spokesman Charity Charamba.

The plane was packed with rand notes in denominations of  100s, 50s, 20s and 10s printed in Munich for the South African Reserve Bank.

Printing South African currency abroad and transporting it back to South Africa is part of contingency planning for currency operations, the Reserve Bank said in a statement, according to IndependentOnline.

“To achieve this and ensure that contingency plans are robust and regularly tested, a small percentage of the reserve bank’s annual bank-note order is outsourced to credible and vetted international printing companies.

“The bulk of South African currency is produced at its wholly owned subsidiary, the South African Banknote Company,” the reserve bank said.

eNCA described details of the diplomatic maneuvers and subsequent release of the plane.

Vusi Mavimbela, South African Ambassador to Zimbabwe, rushed to the airport as soon as the plane was impounded on Sunday, Feb. 14.

On Feb. 15, the South African Reserve Bank “issued a tersely worded statement saying the central bank was looking forward to receiving its precious consignment,” eNCA reported.

South African Defense Force soldiers were sent to guard the plane and its “diplomatic shipment.”

Here’s how a Florida cargo airline company found itself in the middle of an international incident, and what conspiracy theorists are saying, according to BrowardPalmBeachNewTimes.

Western Global is run by a man named James K. Neff, a longtime executive in the world of airfreight.

Back in 1986, a cargo jet operated by a company called Southern Air Transport crashed in Nicaragua and triggered the chain of events that exposed the Iran-Contra scandal. The company was found to be one of the most notorious CIA front companies ever. In 1999, it had just gone bankrupt, and Neff reorganized it under a new name, Southern Air.

Neff’s Southern Air won contracts to operate during the Iraq War. But did he have CIA connections? As for his Western Global, which now operates a fleet of 12 cargo planes, a spokesman, Jon Austin, said he could not confirm or deny whether the company had ever worked with the CIA, citing a policy of not discussing customers.

New Times traced the ownership of the plane, registered as number N545NJ, to a shell company attached to Neff called M48543 LLC. (Shell companies are commonly used in aviation.) Documents list the registered agent for the company as the Palm Beach estate-planning firm of attorney Robert Simses.

Simses also functions as a director for a charity called the Working Partners Foundation. IRS forms show that in 2015, he spent four hours per week working on the charity and that his firm was paid $20,000 to manage it. An article in The Intercept last year claims that before it was transferred to Simses, the charity funneled Pentagon money into North Korea and was used as a cover for intelligence activities.

In a phone interview, Simses said he has helped manage Neff’s estate. He stressed that he is listed as the registered agent for hundreds of companies and that the role of such an agent is to file incorporation papers and not to manage the company’s operations. He denied having any involvement with the plane that landed in Zimbabwe. Simses also denied ever having worked with the Pentagon, insisting the charity was legitimate and gave to a variety of causes.

Referring to the reporter behind the story in The Intercept, he said, “I think that guy was smoking dope,” adding that the article was “a pipedream.”

“I’ve never met anyone at the Pentagon,” he said. “I don’t know anything about moving money to North Korea.”

Zimbabwean authorities are trying to identify the dead man, Charamba said, according to NewsdzeZimbabwe. Police have asked Interpol to trace the
stowaway’s fingerprints and nationality in Cote d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Uganda, Belgium and Germany because the Florida-­based Western Global Airlines plane passed through those countries before it landed in Zimbabwe.

The dead stowaway appeared to have no internal or external injuries. He wore a T-­shirt, trousers held up by a piece of cloth improvised as a belt, and worn-out slippers, NewsdzeZimbabwe reported.

The crew – two Americans, a South African and a Pakistani – spent the week at a five-­ star hotel in the city center. South African reserve bank officials slept on the plane and Zimbabwean security agents stood guard outside.

Aviation enthusiasts have been speculating online that the stowaway would likely have been able to get into the plane from the outside but might have been crushed when thee landing gear retracted.