Southwest Airlines is being sued for “failure to protect a minor” from an inflight sex assault. There are terrible passengers out there, who do terrible things.
Sometimes employees, too, which is why American Airlines is being sued for a flight attendant who was videotaping young girls going to the lavatory. Here there’s no allegation that the perpetrator was an employee. So the suit raises interesting questions around when an airline is responsible for the behavior of its customers. Here is seems to come down to whether the airline failed to take reasonable actions in the face of clear risk.
On July 4, 2022 a family flew from San Diego to Las Vegas to Portland on Southwest, connecting onto Southwest Airlines flight 230 to Portland. They had C boarding group boarding passes, and were forced to take the last seats available on the plane which weren’t together.
The minor was seated between two men. One was “a 50-year-old, heavy-set male…visibly intoxicated and reeking of alcohol.”
The lawsuit details the harrowing sequence of events: the perpetrator grabbed the plaintiff’s leg several times, attempted to kiss him, made inappropriate comments, and touched the plaintiff’s thigh and groin area. The assault escalated as the perpetrator attempted to touch the plaintiff’s anus, rubbed his stomach, and reached into his waistband. Despite the plaintiff’s efforts to push the perpetrator away, the assault continued throughout the flight.
Once on the ground, the boy told his parents who reported the incident to police. The full complaint in Hahn v. Southwest Airlines, filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, has more.
The victim in this story is 16 years old, and even where airlines commit to provide families with seats together that generally applies to children up to age 13.
The family’s lawsuit argues that Southwest should have seen this coming:
- It was a flight out of Las Vegas
- Over 4th of July weekend
- And they should have noticed that the passenger was inebriated
- This is all doubly so because it’s not the first time a passenger has behaved badly on a Southwest flight
That’s their case for negligence on Southwest’s part. When American’s lawyers blamed a 9-year old girl for getting taped by one of their employees in the lavatory, that was abhorrent. They said it was her fault it happened, because she should have known the camera was in there.
- Does a 16 year old have any responsibility to speak up during the flight and flag down help from a flight attendant or scream out?
- While airlines do try to avoid having intoxicated passengers on board their planes, it happens regularly – is it their responsibility to prevent it in all cases? Should there be breathalyzer at each gate?
- The federal government maintains targeting databases, and those in Known Traveler programs have undergone background checks. Should all passengers?
As terrible as this incident sounds, it’s not clear to me from the allegations that Southwest exercised less than its ordinary duty of care, or less care than any other airline would (and does) in similar situations. Obviously the plaintiff will be more sympathetic than the airline here. Equally obvious the party most responsible is the person who actually did the bad thing. And I’m skeptical of the changes that holding Southwest liable would imply. What do you think?
Off-topic, but I have to vent. I literally just took off. 7am in LA
Every window shade is down. Wtf? There is nothing on Instagram more fascinating than watching the ground fall away as you climb into the sky. Someone explain it to me.
All unaccompanied minors ought to be re-located to FC , front row . No Exceptions .
All minors in middle seats ought to be re-located with their actual families . No exceptions .
@LAX Tom … Which airline ? Why cannot you raise your window shade ?
@Alert Delta. I’m not sitting in a window seat.
We teach our children from a young age what inappropriate touching or contact is, and I am not blaming the child here (albeit he is 16 and not a child) but I am surprised he did not get up and let his parents know or ring for assistance, he just sat through it. Again, not BLAMING the boy, I’m just puzzled he did not do something, even start crying if he was afraid. I empathize because I can remember being 16 and I believe I would be fearful but not know what to do about it, but I don’t think I would sit and do nothing. I DO hope the culprit was identified, once the airline was notified, and charges were pressed. These things should NEVER happen.
Maybe to avoid this type of lawsuit. the attendants should do a check from time to time while in-flight. I know it is not their job to police the aisles, and there is probably NO way to keep an inebriated person off a flight once you have already let them on, but this needs to be addressed before we loose a great airline to lawsuits like this. I love SWA and have always had great service. So sad to hear all the things happening in the air that are plain and simple bad, bad behavior, with no recourse while it is happening. I’m sure no one signed on to be a flight attendant thinking they would have to be faced with things like this.
This lawsuit is a classic case of the lawyers naming the deep pockets as the plaintiff. The fat-and-drunken pedo shouldn’t get a pass and should be criminally prosecuted for sexual assault.
What could the airline do if NO ONE spoke up? The flight attendants can’t be expected to monitor the behavior of all passengers throughout the entire flight. This 16 year old reported the problem AFTER he landed? He could have reported it while it was occurring, and then I might find his story more plausible. The family could have insisted on sitting together if they truly felt it necessary. I’ve been on SW flights where the flight attendants have threatened that the plane would not take off until someone volunteered to surrender a seat(s) so that minors could be seated with family members.
Every boy or girl ought to be taught self-defense : devastating quick blows to the throat and groin . They can practice on a stationary piece of wood covered with rope .
They’re going after deep pockets, not fault.
Why should the airline have known there was an issue if she didn’t say anything? Especially since this is Southwest so the FAs don’t know if people sitting next to each other are part of the same group or not.
Love all these comments. If the customer was “visibly intoxicated (whatever that means) and reeking of alcohol” he’s not allowed on the aircraft, period. So yes, if you allow that person on you are going to have liability for his behavior.
Having been an airline employee, a visibly intoxicated and reeking of alcohol passenger would not be flying for at least 8 more hours. First question, however, is what 16 year old boy does not have the brains to use the call button or get up from his seat and tell his parents, flight attendant or for that matter very loudly protest the actions of the person in the next seat.
This is an obvious work of fiction or parents looking to get rich quick.
@LAX Tom
As far as I know, it is Federal requirement that all shades must up for takeoff and landings. That is failure by flight attendants.
As a shy person who had a hard time speaking up for myself, and as parent to a teen who also can’t self advocate, this is scary. But it’s not just minors. Anyone being harassed should know it’s OK to speak up and their seat MUST changed. Airlines need to see to this.
I was 19, standing on a rush hour subway in summer. A man started to rub his front up against me. I finally screamed “STOP TOUCHING ME!”. That’s all it took for 2 other nearby men to immediately say, “change places with me”. Everyone shuffled around and they stood between me and the gross man the rest of my ride. We all must reach inside for that comment, no matter how awful it feels to make a scene.
“ Does a 16 year old have any responsibility to speak up during the flight and flag down help from a flight attendant or scream out?”
Good point. It’s not a 5 y.o. girl. This allegedly went on and on and on. How could some FA have known what was happening?
When I was 16, that guy would get a broken nose from my flying elbow.
@Alert: Not very alert, are you? The boy was not an unaccompanied minor.
How about reading the story next time before opining?
My young adult daughter was on a month-long, independent study program in Xela, Guatemala. She is a globally traveled young woman who has learned to keep her wits sharp – she’s very petite and can look vulnerable. While in Xela, she never walked around alone at night. However, in the daytime she did go out in her “safe for tourists” neighborhood to run errands.
One morning she went to a coffee shop and got a cup of coffee today. Some creepy teen began following her and got closer and closer. She turned to him and yelled, “stop following me”. He slowed down, then began catching up with her again. She stopped abruptly, turned around and yelled, “I TOLD you to stop following me!” and then promptly threw the cup of hot coffee in his face. The guy ran off screaming, and that was the end of that.
Southwest is failing miserably across the board – this just adds to the reason people are not happy with Southwest. Yes, the boy should have gotten up and thrown a fit but maybe he was threatened? Why didn’t the other guy step up and help the boy? Were they both harassing the child? At 16 one would hope they are confident in themselves enough but do you REALLY think that is the case in this ridiculously polarized world we now live in where every perversion going on were told it’s ok and to shut our mouths or be called “haters” etc?
Southwest needs to start by letting people purchase their seats which would stop 90% of their massive failures.
You wild no longer have families split up – no more liars pretending they need “pre-board” as they would be assigned whatever seats or buy what they want.
Those two things alone would make Southwest a 100% better airline.
One thing most airlines do to identify passengers during unusual situations is their seat assignment. Southwest can not use that form of verification.
Alert says:
July 20, 2024 at 8:18 am
I agree – but instead of FC/first class I’d put them in the last row by the galley which almost always has a FA. It would sure reduce the liability risk.
@Alan Z… There is no federal requirement in the USA to have window shades open for takeoff.
@LAX Tom: The shades are down because anyone who is doing Vegas right is hungover AF at 7 AM and definitely doesn’t want sunlight beating into the cabin.
The shades are also down to help keep the temperature in the plane down while it’s at the gate since on-ground climate control on planes isn’t as robust as in-air climate control.
And many prefer the shades down because sunlight causes glare on screens.
@Alan Z: You don’t know very far. Regulations don’t care if shades are up or down except for the exit row, so the shade doesn’t get stuck shut when you need to determine if it’s safe to open the exit door (not even sure that’s a fed regulation vs. airline practice). On the ground, airlines may prefer them down during the day (see climate control above) and up at night (visibility to other aircraft.)
Sue the pedophile. If he has done this previously and SWA has had a complaint why would they allow him to continue his behavior on their airlin?. If they did know, then they are at least partially responsible.
Seems very questionable that it even happened as reported. 16 year old said nothing, crew saw nothing, passenger that was right next to them saw/heard nothing? Definitely going for the deep pockets
If this is factual, why wasn’t the pedophile identified by the 16-yr old to his parents? Then immediately file police report and have the bastard arrested. Something isn’t quite right here it seems.
Geez, I hope none of you ever have a child who is sexually assaulted! Nothing like blaming the victim. I do wonder how the person on the other side of the kid didn’t notice anything? We’re all so close together on planes now – you’d have to be willfully ignoring assault not to see it (or asleep, I suppose).
The kid was old enough he should have done something for himself
@american at 16 I was not STUIPID. Kids today know more now then they did in the 50s 60s 70s 80s. What was not spoken about then is talked about now. Any 16 yr old that does not know that they need to get out of that situation then something is wrong with that 16 yr old.
Aviation regulations in most other countries explicitly require all window shades be raised for taxi, takeoff, and landing for safety reasons…
The airline does have an obligation to bar intoxicated individuals from boarding an aircraft. Unfortunately, it being Vegas, unless the person is causing an obvious disruption, they won’t remove the individual (too much trouble than it’s worth).
As for the boy…. It could be very likely he was embarrassed or didn’t want to cause a diversion (if I was his age and that was happening to me, I would be skimming through all the potential consequences of speaking up). However, if I was a parent, I would’ve made an effort (as I see happen frequently), to check on him throughout the flight.
That was a lot going on for no one else to have noticed it and spoke up. If it happened, he may have been both scared and in shock.
I truly wonder where the parents sat. Did Mom and Dad sit together and send their child off on his own? If that’s the case, shame on them.
Good kids are taught to be relatively docile around strangers so I can somewhat understand his failure to alert others. He could have got up to go to the bathroom but it is possible that the drunk guy got enough information from him to keep him quiet. I traveled alone by bus at 17 with no problems but that was a time when perverts didn’t have as many rights as they do now.
What was the other man doing?
There are a lot of unknowns with this story.
Reading through the comments, I see the classic American response to issues like this. Basically, across the board with no real information to base a response upon.
My biggest question amongst many is, how does Southwest become responsible for this.
The lawsuit will obvious make any situation sound much worse than it is, but saying anyone is visibly anything is going to be relative to the opinion of the person making the statement.
Beyond those two issues with this story there are many more to figure out before naming Southwest as somehow liable.
Without question, the man who did the touching should be charged and given his day in court. But, to name Southwest liable, there needs to be an investigation, and decay presented based upon law as to how they may be negligent.
You cannot just go calling third parties negligent without facts of the situation, and their legal liabilities.
If the kid is not capable of speaking up for himself, the parents should not let him sit alone. I can’t believe a 16 year old doesn’t have the wherewithall to get up and go to the parents who couldn’t have been more than 35 steps away.
I’ve never been on a flight where if the request was made politely and with a good reason, a switch won’t happen.
Was the perp a man or woman? Story doesn’t say anything about what happened to this individual.
I am absolutely disgusted by the amount of victim blaming here, obviously y’all have never had something traumatic happen to you. You people are absolutely sick. Shame on each of you blaming the effing KID. JFC
Apparently the offender was drunk and if he had not been allowed to board this horrific incident would not have occurred. I have long felt that alcohol should not be served in the airport or on planes and that passengers who become inebriated before arriving at the airport should not be allowed to board. It is not “punishing” responsible drinkers to ask them to wait a few hours between drinks.
Why didn’t the passenger on the other side do something? Why didn’t he scream bloody murder? Too many holes in the story. Money grab.
Not victim blaming, but I find it odd that a 16 year old boy wouldn’t put up sufficient resistance. Something just seems a bit off. Also, at 16, you’re old enough to know how to either alert someone or defend yourself. What part of this is missing? No, the airline is not responsible in this case. I don’t think they could have reasonably anticipated it, nor do I think the seating assignment was unreasonable. Given the boys reaction, I would be more concerned that the boy had been molested previously, or was being molested currently, outside of this event.
I wanted to weigh in on this situation because I think that airline companies should protect minors on flights big time, especially if they are travelling alone. They are Absolutely responsible for those minors,which means protecting them at all times
I find it fascinating that people still use incidents to bash SW for open seating. Like this is the source of all ills. If you don’t like open seating, simply don’t fly SW and be quiet about it. No one cares. I like the open seating and how SW operates, so I use them. It’s my choice. It’s your choice not to.
I agree with many— something about this story doesn’t add up— I suppose I could understand if he had a neurodivergence or developmental delay/ but most boys of that age, a stranger, would have reacted. It’s one thing when there’s grooming or an authoritative relationship— but to let some drunk rando and not call the FA, hit him, something? According to the story, he tried to push him off- so it doesn’t seem like there’s a mental development issue there (one would presume a condition that would prevent a FA call would also prevent a pushback attempt?)
When I was in my early 30’s I had a window seat on a flight from San Francisco to Boston and there was an attractive young woman next to me in the middle seat. She said she was nervous about landing and asked if she could hold my hand. After landing (safely) she invited me to her apartment, but I explained that I had a connecting flight to London in 3 hours time.
In retrospect I have a suspicion that her fear of landing was feigned?
Would it be too late for me to sue the airline now?
Some people are suggesting that the 16yo “should have reacted differently”. There are many different ways in which people respond to crisis situations. One of which is denial (“this can’t really be happening to me”) and another is a failure to comprehend how bad a situation is. For example people sitting in a cafe while the building burns around them (real example The Great Hinckley Firestorm). It’s such an abstract concept that they just don’t react for self protection. Think of all the SA victims who realize years later that “huh, that thing that happened to me was not ok”. Also boys aren’t taught to be aware of SA as much as girls are, so it doesn’t surprise me that he didn’t say anything.
What ticks me off is the other adult man sitting next to the boy who literally did nothing. What is the likelihood he didn’t see something and didn’t say anything? Disgraceful! Having said that I’m not sure what else the airline could have done.
Tom LAX
Shades are down to keep the cabin cooler. It’s the right thing to do.
Just open it!!!!
Rene S
At one time if a boy complained an alpha male would stand up and support him against the pervert. Then another alpha male would get involved. Then the flight attendants would get involved in support of the boy and the alpha males. The police and the courts would side with the victim and others against the pervert. We live in a different world today. All of those getting involved could end up in jeopardy. A strong masculine response is no longer the one championed and defended by society. I can understand the boy staying silent until he was in a safe place. If the other man in the row actually saw the actions of the situation (many people put in earphones and purposely ignore everything around them), he may still not have wanted to get involved because of a wrong response by the flight attendants could lead in him being banned or worse.