Officer fired for dragging Dr. David Dao off United flight sues airline, Chicago

[Oxman]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...-flight-sues-united-chicago-article-1.3928254

I call BS. Any lawyer should have laughed him out of their office.

CHICAGO - An aviation security officer fired after forcibly dragging a passenger from a plane last year has filed a lawsuit against United Airlines and the city of Chicago.
James Long was one of the officers called to a plane in April 2017 after Dr. David Dao refused to give up his seat. Video taken by other passengers show Long dragging a bloodied Dao from the plane. Long was fired in August.
Long filed a lawsuit Tuesday in Cook County Circuit Court against the Chicago Department of Aviation and United.
The suit alleges Long didn't receive proper training to respond to the situation and that United should have known security officers would use physical force.
Spokesmen for United and the city say they haven't yet received the lawsuit and declined to comment.

 

[mrivc211]

If he can show that physical force was used in the past he has a point. If he can show that no official training was given in this situation he has a point. Does United want to drag this out even further, or throw $50,000 at him to make it go away quickly. He was probably making around that in salary. United CEO probably has suits in his closet worth over $200,000. They don't give a rats behind about $50k. Done.

 

[mshunter]

Good for him, I hope he wins.

 

[DogwoodLynx]

I don't doubt that he hasn't had much training. Most security guards don't.

The opportunities are there to get more training but most people won't do it, and companies dang sure aren't going to pay for it.


About the only guys I knew that got good training were ones that went to work for Executive VIP Protection (and highly prefer Former Military or LE).

 

[Stryker172]

Whatever happened to exercising common sense and good judgment?

 

[TWP]

Whatever happened to exercising common sense and good judgment?

You have to pay a decent wage to get that and even then.......

 

[Oxman]

Whatever happened to exercising common sense and good judgment?

From the start I (as a former cop) said he should have said this is an airline issue not a security issue. FA you handle it.

 

[Oxman]

You have to pay a decent wage to get that and even then.......

You're right about that. As a LEO trainer I've worked with some cops where I wanted to say you wait here, I'll run into the gang and drug infested projects by myself. I think I did say wait here a few times.

 

[Deleted member 27505]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...-flight-sues-united-chicago-article-1.3928254

I call BS. Any lawyer should have laughed him out of their office.

CHICAGO - An aviation security officer fired after forcibly dragging a passenger from a plane last year has filed a lawsuit against United Airlines and the city of Chicago.
James Long was one of the officers called to a plane in April 2017 after Dr. David Dao refused to give up his seat. Video taken by other passengers show Long dragging a bloodied Dao from the plane. Long was fired in August.
Long filed a lawsuit Tuesday in Cook County Circuit Court against the Chicago Department of Aviation and United.
The suit alleges Long didn't receive proper training to respond to the situation and that United should have known security officers would use physical force.
Spokesmen for United and the city say they haven't yet received the lawsuit and declined to comment.

View attachment 42778

Aviation Security Officer? What is that? A Cop? Paul Blart? What?

Knowing only what's stated in the OP, here's the scary part ... he and his attorney are justifying the suit based at least partly on: "United should have known security officers would use physical force."

Ok, what's the obvious implication/assumption of that statement, seemingly on the part of all involved? That security at airports is essentially the servant of the airline, or at least perceived to be.

If the "security officer" was in fact LEO, then WTF, over? Folks need to understand that Cops - however often it may appear otherwise - are not employees of, nor beholden to, any private company or individual.

If not, same. Private "security" at a public facility? Hmmm. United can call in Paul to rough up the agitators while being afforded plausible deniability and cover of the corporate veil through a third party liability arrangement??

 

[MikeD]

From the start I (as a former cop) said he should have said this is an airline issue not a security issue. FA you handle it.

Its a tricky issue. Where it becomes an LE issue is if he doesnt follow the orders to vacate the aircraft and so now he can be labled as trespassing. However...... if he is sitting in a seat, while holding a ticket that has his name on it, has that seat number, and says he paid for that seat, is he a trespasser?

So now, this whole situation is where it is now, and United could have handled this far better than they did, especialy with his being a paying revenue pax who had already been legitimately boarded and seated, in his assigned seat. Its far more trouble than its worth trying to boot him from that merely for internal crew movement purposes. If it had been a bump before boarding, then thats one thing. In this case, its one where its probably better to eat the cost of moving the crew in some other way rather than kicking the guy off.

 

[mshunter]

Its a tricky issue. Where it becomes an LE issue is if he doesnt follow the orders to vacate the aircraft and so now he can be labled as trespassing. However...... if he is sitting in a seat, while holding a ticket that has his name on it, has that seat number, and says he paid for that seat, is he a trespasser?

So now, this whole situation is where it is now, and United could have handled this far better than they did, especialy with his being a paying revenue pax who had already been legitimately boarded and seated, in his assigned seat. Its far more trouble than its worth trying to boot him from that merely for internal crew movement purposes. If it had been a bump before boarding, then thats one thing. In this case, its one where its probably better to eat the cost of moving the crew in some other way rather than kicking the guy off.

When he doesn't follow a crew members instructions, it becomes a legal issue.

When he gets off the airplane, and gets back on after being told not to, it also becomes a legal issue.

Mr. Dao should be on a no fly list. He refused to follow an officers command, then resisted. Take your claims of whatever with a judge, the police are going to win this round.

 

[MikeD]

When he doesn't follow a crew members instructions, it becomes a legal issue.

When he gets off the airplane, and gets back on after being told not to, it also becomes a legal issue.

Mr. Dao should be on a no fly list. He refused to follow an officers command, then resisted. Take your claims of whatever with a judge, the police are going to win this round.

Agreed. Once he ceased following the instructions, now it's an LE issue. However UAL shouldn't at all be surprised that "force may possibly be used", because up to this point, he hadn't followed instructions. Granted, it had good case to be upset as a paying passenger who hadn't done anything except legitimately board the plane and go sit in his assigned seat and mind his own business; then all of a sudden is being told he's being kicked off the plane.....all so UAL can board crew that it needs to take somewhere? He has a great case to make for bad customer service, as like I said before, UAL should've just eaten the cost of getting a crew out there if there was no other way to, rather than screw over a revenue pax who had already been properly boarded and seated per his purchased ticket. Essentially being invited into the house, then being told to leave for no real good reason. Customer service fail.

 

[Stone Cold]

When he doesn't follow a crew members instructions, it becomes a legal issue.

When he gets off the airplane, and gets back on after being told not to, it also becomes a legal issue.

Mr. Dao should be on a no fly list. He refused to follow an officers command, then resisted. Take your claims of whatever with a judge, the police are going to win this round.

The doctor is going to get a multi million dollar payout, guaranteed. I wouldn't call that a win for the police. Whether in the wrong or not policy wise, there is no jury in the U.S. that will watch that video of him being dragged out of the plane, and not side with him.

 

[Deleted member 27505]

When he doesn't follow a crew members instructions, it becomes a legal issue.

When he gets off the airplane, and gets back on after being told not to, it also becomes a legal issue.

Mr. Dao should be on a no fly list. He refused to follow an officers command, then resisted. Take your claims of whatever with a judge, the police are going to win this round.

You know, there may be a clause in the boilerplate of the contract of carriage that allows this kind of stupid to be legal. But even if something is found to be legal in contract court that doesn't make it right, nor does it make it legal in tort court. Additionally, I'm not even sure a contract judge would be down with this. A contract possesses a "spirit". A contract is essentially a meeting of minds. "I give you this. You give me that in exchange." In Dao's case: "I give you money. You give me a seat from point A to point B." As has been pointed out, in this case that contract had essentially been fulfilled. Dao had paid and had been given his seat. It was then randomly and violently snatched from him in abrogation of the essential spirit of the contract... and likely, in violation of other civil codes.

Was Captain Chesty Thumper or FA Imma Inchargehere technically within his or her rights to kick the man off the plane? Perhaps, but with what arguable justification? Safety of Flight? Expediency? "Because I said so and you'll respect m'aah'thorita!"?
What is correct and decent and sensible is often very different from what is technically legal.

If you persist in your foolish consistency, I can only hope that you one day find yourself in the position of the fellow who was rendered paraplegic by an accident and was denied the disability insurance he had been paying into for years because he didn't walk to the claims desk and fill out the form stating he was now paraplegic, as per the terms outlined in 6pt text on page 64 of the contract. (No, I do not actually wish that upon you. )

Laws and policies, properly crafted and executed, are designed not to create petty hierarchies of power or to allow sneaky behavior through slight-of-pen; they are designed to make the world a better, safer, and more efficient place. I'm sure you can see how none of those goals were achieved in this case, hmmm? If you can't, rest assured, a jury will.

 

[dbrault17]

I don't think the "spirit" of the contract is as easy as flying from point A to point B for a said amount of consideration. There are many fare classes that people buy that are essentially different products even if all of them include being flown from point A to B. If the real fare was the Y fare that included protections from being bumped but another fare class was offered at a discount price with the understanding that you may be bumped I would think United would have every right to execute those provisions of that contract. Although I have no idea what fare class Dr. Doa bought, I'm just speculating.
And the Doctor was not in his seat and just snatched out of it at the last minute. He volunteered his seat for the compensation United was offering and went to up to the gate. And after he found out he wasn't going to get there till the next day he ran past the gate agent and went back to his seat. I ask any captain on this what would you have done at that point? Allow him to stay? Treat him as a security threat?

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

The doctor is going to get a multi million dollar payout, guaranteed. I wouldn't call that a win for the police. Whether in the wrong or not policy wise, there is no jury in the U.S. that will watch that video of him being dragged out of the plane, and not side with him.

He already did. United settled for an undisclosed amount.

 

[Stone Cold]

He already did. United settled for an undisclosed amount.

I hadn't kept up with it. Thanks for the update.

 

[msmspilot]

And the Doctor was not in his seat and just snatched out of it at the last minute. He volunteered his seat for the compensation United was offering and went to up to the gate. And after he found out he wasn't going to get there till the next day he ran past the gate agent and went back to his seat. I ask any captain on this what would you have done at that point? Allow him to stay? Treat him as a security threat?

This. After he voluntarily got off and then pushed his way back on, the parking brake is set. Done.

 

[Deleted member 27505]

I don't think the "spirit" of the contract is as easy as flying from point A to point B for a said amount of consideration. There are many fare classes that people buy that are essentially different products even if all of them include being flown from point A to B. If the real fare was the Y fare that included protections from being bumped but another fare class was offered at a discount price with the understanding that you may be bumped I would think United would have every right to execute those provisions of that contract. Although I have no idea what fare class Dr. Doa bought, I'm just speculating.
And the Doctor was not in his seat and just snatched out of it at the last minute. He volunteered his seat for the compensation United was offering and went to up to the gate. And after he found out he wasn't going to get there till the next day he ran past the gate agent and went back to his seat. I ask any captain on this what would you have done at that point? Allow him to stay? Treat him as a security threat?

Ok, fair enough. That's new information to me, as it likely would be to most non-airline folks who are familiar with this story.

I still think you are missing the bigger picture I'm trying to make about how airlines run their outfits, and about how commerce in general is increasing succumbing to the allure of playing games with fine print. Perhaps the dear doctor was one of the small minority of the flying public that enjoys these games, knew exactly what he was doing, and sought to benefit from an arbitrage opportunity. I don't know. If he was, then let him and the airlines duke it out for king of the dung pile.

The point I'm trying to make is that injecting complexity bordering on duplicity into what are perceived to be, and should be, mundane offers is a dangerous game to play. It can and does often result in undesired consequences. It can and does reduce the general sense of trust toward companies involved, commerce in general, and within society overall. The vast majority of folks who buy an airline ticket expect to buy a seat from point A to point B, and once sitting in it, they have the expectation that it is theirs.

I still say that if this goes to a jury and the dear doctor doesn't act like an idiot, almost any jury will find for him. Average people -the kind who comprise most juries- are sick and tired of false promises and bait and switch tactics. But I guess I don't have to prove that now. As @Maximillian_Jenius pointed out, it appears United finally recognized that, and settled for an undisclosed amount.

 

[CoffeeIcePapers]

This. After he voluntarily got off and then pushed his way back on, the parking brake is set. Done.

Call real police then, not Paul Blart.