A teenage girl who says she discovered a camera in an airplane bathroom is suing American Airlines

Lee Duna@lemmy.nz to News@lemmy.world – 487 points –
A teenage girl who says she discovered a camera in an airplane bathroom is suing American Airlines
apnews.com
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Lawyers for the 14-year-old and her parents say that American “knew or should have known the flight attendant was a danger.” They say the failure of other crew members to confiscate the employee's phone allowed him to destroy evidence.

Well that's pretty damning. Makes me wonder how many other times this flight attendant has done this.

Tf?

Do you see that image, look how fucking visible the flash is and it’s in the dead centre of the seat. No way a 14 year old would not see that giant arse phone stickers to the lid.

Also

The family said an FBI agent later told the girl’s mother they did not arrest the man because they did not find any incriminating images on his phone.

Innocent until proven guilty, and allegedly he’s been cleared by the FBI. Yet you’re here acting like he’s guilty, has a history of this, and should never have been hired.

Ummmm Was that an employee's phone taped to the toilet seat? Criminals being unbelievably bad at crime is not a defense. The FBI can't arrest somebody without evidence, but nobody is claiming that they didn't tape a phone to a toilet seat.

Of course! Let's consider the following extremely reasonable options:

  • The attendant accidentally left his phone in the bathroom (with the flash on, or no passcode so a malicious 14 yo could turn it on). Kid goes in the bathroom and hatches a plot. Peels the sticker perfectly off broken seat lid, attaches the phone, and takes a picture of it.

  • Same as above, but the girl finds a pad of the stickers and a sharpie also left on the bathroom, thereby removing the need to peel. OR she carries her own pad of the united broken stickers and a sharpie.

  • The kid pickpockets his phone on the way by and either of the options above. Roll for dexterity!

  • The bathroom was so dark at the start of the flight, our good Samaritan flight attendant tapes a phone with the light on under a broken sticker (even though it's fine to use) and writes seat broken on it just so everyone is aware anyway. Everyone can now see and doesn't fall in.

All completely sane and reasonable alternatives to assuming an unnamed individual (who is not getting publicly maligned because he's unidentified) was trying to add kiddie fun bits to his spank bank.

Or it’s a parents phone, staged for a photo being why nothing was found on the accused’s, not that anything was ever taken.

In which case there is no traction for police or anyone else and this doesn't become an article. Flight attendant says "no my phone is right here" and it's all done. This theory doesn't hold water.

You mean like how they let him go after checking it wasn’t him?

That's not what the article says. It says 1) they didn't confiscate the phone after the incident, and 2) there were no pictures when they later checked.

He was not detained because there were no pictures on the phone. Luckily there is no feature in a phone that lets you remove videos or photos once taken, otherwise his innocence beyond reasonable doubt might be questioned.

Mate.

Deleting a photo off your phone does not wipe the data, they can recover that in seconds after plugging your phone in and copying all the data which is frequently done at airports.

I would agree with you except it says the father was shown no pictures and later that the FBI didn't arrest him. What it doesn't say is the duration in between dad and FBI. There is not some permanent record of deleted files in your iPhone if you keep using it and it's not confiscated. It doesn't read like authorities picked the FA up at the stop, but more like this is a protracted dispute.

Even if no pictures in the first place it's still suspicious AF and the sort of thing I would expect to receive a special visit by Chris Hansen.

No.

It is not suspicious at, the accused has done literally nothing wrong.

All they have is a claim leveled against them with nothing to support it.

Stop judging innocent people based on nothing.

Circumstantial evidence is not nothing dude.

  • Directs young girl to different bathroom
  • In bathroom first
  • His phone in the bathroom
  • Photographic evidence of said phone in a compromising position.

This is all evidence. There's no refutation in the article. The only thing that is not there is some direct indicator of intent. It was enough to warrant a phone search and to dismiss him from work, and a clean search doesn't mean dick by itself because intent to snag this kind of photo is also a punishable offence:

18 U.S. Code § 2251 - Sexual exploitation of children See section (e)

So what if there’s no refutation in the article?

Do you expect the journalist ever got a chance to speak to the attendant?

When they rang the company to speak to them about the incident what is more likely “Oh yeah sure I’ll transfer you over to him have a nice chat” or “We here at Flight Company take all matters very seriously and will look into the matter”?

Why do you assume because this article is one sided hearsay, that it must be the truth and journalists investigated every angle so a lack of mention is an omission of guilt?

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If you read the article, it seems the phone was most definitely the flight attendants.

No it does not.

Quote me exactly where it says anything remotely close to this.

"Lawyers for the family suggested that the flight attendant removed the phone and erased images of the girl before letting her father see his iPhone photos."

There's another spot as well mentioning the father taking the phone from him, but some crap ad is keeping the text covered up. So yes. It says the guy got the phone back and then the dad demanded to see his pictures on his phone.

So a theory.

Lawyers presented a theory for why no images were found, and you take that as evidence?

Jesus christ, man. The article literally says he made the Steward show the pictures on his phone. Did you fail reading comprehension back in grade school?

Lawyers for the family suggested that the flight attendant removed the phone and erased images of the girl before letting her father see his iPhone photos.

That does not say the phone was most definitely his in any way, shape, or form.

For all you know the father demanded to look at his phone, he let him, the father found nothing and claimed he must've taken the phone back and deleted the photos. That does not prove fucking shit, it's one sides story that is so far not backed up by any evidence.

You wanted the quote from the article. I gave you the quote from the article. Don't go claiming "well the article might not be true" yadda yadda yadda. Don't go changing the argument to something else after I showed you that you were wrong, dumbass.

No, you gave me a quote that doesn’t back-up your claim.

If you read the article, it seems the phone was most definitely the flight attendants.

If you read the article, the only link between the phone in the seat and the one in the attendants position is the suggestion of a third party lawyer.

No where is a definitive claim laid out that they are the same phone.

Is it so hard for you people to stop trying to ruin innocent people’s lives with your witch hunt?

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That one would be easily refuted by the other flight attendents since the complaint claims he was given his phone back. One assumes no one is refuting his phone was in the bathroom at least.

And did anyone ask them to back up the claim for the news article?

We don’t even have one sides story let alone others involved in it.

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Seems to be a civil lawsuit, so the standards are different. The investigation is also ongoing. Obtaining the photos is unlikely the only crime. Attempting to obtain the photos is also likely a crime. The FBI agent is not the judge of what is our is not illegal.

The flight attendant was not identified. They are not getting paid, but that is fully different than being punished for a crime (still has a negative impact on them.)

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Ah, about destroying evidence - last I checked, it's not as simple as just deleting stuff. So (if investigators get their hands on the actual phone, if they get a decent digital forensics expert, if Apple cooperates maybe) there'll be evidence of both the root crime and the crime of trying to conceal it.

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How exactly is one supposed to just know someone's a criminal? And what do they think the flight attendants job description is?

Throw the guy in jail, terrible it happened. But I dont see how they're gonna get anywhere in that lawsuit

How do you know this guy is guilty and should be thrown in jail?

Innocent until proven guilty only applies in the courts. For everywhere else, it seems to be guilty until proven innocent, and sometimes still guilty despite proof.

That's because most people are complete fucking morons.

It's nothing something we should ever remain silent on and let be acceptable.

So you'd be totally ok letting someone, who you've seen on video beating a child, babysit for you? After all, innocent until proven guilty

Are you a fucking idiot?

If you watch someone do the thing, you can be pretty assured they are guilty of doing the thing.

Allegedly

It’s not ann allegation if you’ve seen it happen.

It literally is. This thread is about assumption of innocence until convicted.

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The whole point of the lawsuit is that they couldn't find evidence because the other flight attendants gave him his phone back after he'd been caught. They're suing because he committed an obvious offense against a minor, and the employees didn't take the accusation seriously enough not to let evidence get destroyed.

The criminal case may be a lost cause now, but the evidence we do have is pretty damning and does warrant a lawsuit against the company that enabled what happened.

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This is the most stupidest criminal ever.

The camera is a "iPhone taped to the toilet".

If I hadn't read what the photo is about, I would think it's just a notice that the seat should not be used as it's, eh, "broken" as written, and the phone with the light is there as an additional joke. But whatever.

Seems pretty damning assuming the girl’s story is true.