Passenger charged with punching flight attendant
A California man who was captured on video punching an American Airlines flight attendant during a flight from Mexico to Los Angeles was arrested this week, the Justice Department said, the latest instance of unruly behavior in the skies as coronavirus restrictions loosen and travel picks up. The man, Alexander Tung Cuu Le, 33, of Westminster, Calif., was charged on Thursday with one count of interference with flight crew members, a day after he ran up to a flight attendant and punched him in the back of the head, the Justice Department said in a news release. Mr. Le could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Jelani Lindsey, a lawyer at the Office of the Federal Public Defender who is representing Le, did not immediately respond to a call seeking comment on Thursday. The Association of Professional Flight Attendants, a union that represents about 24,000 flight attendants at American Airlines, said in a statement that “this violent behavior puts the safety of all passengers and crew in jeopardy and must stop.” The charges against Le came as air travelers and crews continued to face an unusually high number of disruptions since the onset of the pandemic. In 2019, 146 investigations into unruliness on planes were initiated. So far in 2022, there have been 680 such investigations, according to data from the FAA.<br/>
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Passenger charged with punching flight attendant
A California man who was captured on video punching an American Airlines flight attendant during a flight from Mexico to Los Angeles was arrested this week, the Justice Department said, the latest instance of unruly behavior in the skies as coronavirus restrictions loosen and travel picks up. The man, Alexander Tung Cuu Le, 33, of Westminster, Calif., was charged on Thursday with one count of interference with flight crew members, a day after he ran up to a flight attendant and punched him in the back of the head, the Justice Department said in a news release. Mr. Le could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Jelani Lindsey, a lawyer at the Office of the Federal Public Defender who is representing Le, did not immediately respond to a call seeking comment on Thursday. The Association of Professional Flight Attendants, a union that represents about 24,000 flight attendants at American Airlines, said in a statement that “this violent behavior puts the safety of all passengers and crew in jeopardy and must stop.” The charges against Le came as air travelers and crews continued to face an unusually high number of disruptions since the onset of the pandemic. In 2019, 146 investigations into unruliness on planes were initiated. So far in 2022, there have been 680 such investigations, according to data from the FAA.<br/>
