United Airlines crew refuses to protect teen girl exposed to sex act

A California teenager is suing United Airlines after she claims the company did nothing to stop the man from performing a sexual act on himself midflight.

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Monica Amestoy, 18, is being represented by Gloria Allred. The offense occurred last October and the perpetrator has pled guilty.

Highlights

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
Catholic Online (https://www.catholic.org)
6/4/2013 (6 years ago)

Published in Travel

Keywords: Gloria Allred, Monica Amestoy, team, flight, United Airlines, assault, false imprisonment, negligence

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LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Monica Amestoy, 18, said that while flying from New York to Los Angeles last October a male passenger seated next to her began to grope himself. Amestoy said she notified a flight attendant who made the man stop.

After the flight attendant left, Amestoy says the man deliberately exposed himself and resumed his deviant act. After notifying the flight attendant a second time and asking to be moved, she was told that she could not move because there were no available seats in her class.

This essentially left the teenager in an extraordinarily humiliating and uncomfortable position.

Upon landing, Amestoy reported the incident to police and the FBI investigated, but only months later. According to Tom Amestoy, the perpetrator eventually confessed and was ordered to register as a sex offender.

Despite being aware of the issue since October, United Airlines has done virtually nothing to compensate Amestoy or to protect other passengers from such behavior.

The suit filed against the airline accuses them of negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and false imprisonment.

Gloria Allred, who is representing Amestoy says the flight crew did nothing to stop the situation or to protect the teen girl. "The flight attendant stated that the perpetrators conduct was disgusting," Allred told the media, "but took no action to relocate Monica to another seat or to report the offensive conduct to the flight deck."

Even worse, when her father Tom Amestoy sent a letter to United complaining about the situation, he received in response a form letter containing a generically worded apology.

"None of us, who especially have daughters, would want our daughters to be in the position that Monica was in during that flight," Allred said.

United simply replied, "the comfort and security of our customers is our top priority and we will closely review this complaint when we receive it."

It's difficult to see that United has any defense in this case, and as customary, the matter will likely be settled out of court.

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