JetBlue Attendant Held on Bail as Lawyer Cites Abuse on Flight
By ANDY NEWMAN AND MICK MEENAN NY TIMES
Mr. Slater on MySpace.Updated, 2:54 p.m. Steven Slater, the JetBlue flight attendant who activated an exit chute on a just-landed plane at Kennedy International Airport after a dispute with a passenger Monday and slid to notoriety, did not post the $2,500 bail set by a judge at his arraignment Tuesday morning and remains in custody.
Though friends were said to be trying to raise money for him and a Steven Slater Legal Defense Fund on Facebook has already attracted dozens of members, Mr. Slater was placed on a bus around 2:30 p.m. and driven from the courthouse in Queens towards Rikers Island.
At the arraignment on felony charges of reckless endangerment and criminal mischief in a packed room in the basement of criminal court, Mr. Slater’s court-appointed lawyer, Howard Turman, said that Mr. Slater’s activation of the slide was not reckless. He said Mr. Slater followed the proper procedure for activating the slide, checking out the window first to make sure no one was on the tarmac who could be struck by it.
Mr. Turman, of the Legal Aid Society, offered an account of the flight, JetBlue 1052 from Pittsburgh, that he said justified Mr. Slater’s actions. He told reporters that on the ground in Pittsburgh, a female passenger had been verbally and physically abusive to Mr. Slater when he intervened as she squabbled with a male passenger over access to the overhead luggage compartment.
“The woman initially at Pittsburgh slammed the overhead into his head,” Mr. Turman said of Mr. Slater.
A passenger on the flight, Greg Kanczes, said that he saw a large, fresh-looking gash on Mr. Slater’s forehead at the beginning of the flight. “It was about an inch-and-half long, and it was a big red mark or cut,” Mr. Kanczes said by phone Tuesday. “There was no bandage.”
In previous accounts offered by the authorities, Mr. Slater’s main altercation with the passenger had come at the end of the flight, not the beginning, with the passenger pulling a bag out of the overhead compartment that struck Mr. Slater in the head.
Update The law enforcement authorities have declined to identify the passenger and would not say if she had been interviewed. JetBlue said it could not release the passenger’s name because of privacy rules.
Meanwhile, in an interview on the celebrity-news Web site TMZ, a woman who says she was married to Mr. Slater in the 1990s and remains friendly with him said that she talked to Mr. Slater’s ailing mother after his arrest Monday. The woman, Cynthia Susanne, said that Mr. Slater’s mother told her that Mr. Slater said that the passenger had “maliciously” pulled the compartment door down to hit Mr. Slater in the head, but that the altercation had occurred at the end of the flight.
The version offered by Mr. Turman indicates a longer-simmering animus between the two parties.
Mr. Turman said that on the ground at Kennedy, the tension flared up again. When the female passenger tried to get her bag out of the overhead before the crew had given permission and Mr. Slater instructed her to remain seated, Mr. Turman said, the woman “was outraged and cursing” at Mr. Slater, who “wanted to avoid a conflict.”
Law enforcement officials said that after the passenger cursed at Mr. Slater, he grabbed the intercom, cursed her out, bid passengers goodbye, grabbed a beer and activated the inflatable exit chute. In court, an assistant district attorney, Benjamin Martell, said that Mr. Slater said over the plane’s intercom, “Those of you who have shown dignity and respect for 20 years, have a great ride,” before making his final exit.
When asked why Mr. Slater chose to avoid the conflict by taking the emergency slide, Mr. Turman replied, “It was right there.”
By ANDY NEWMAN AND MICK MEENAN NY TIMES
Mr. Slater on MySpace.Updated, 2:54 p.m. Steven Slater, the JetBlue flight attendant who activated an exit chute on a just-landed plane at Kennedy International Airport after a dispute with a passenger Monday and slid to notoriety, did not post the $2,500 bail set by a judge at his arraignment Tuesday morning and remains in custody.
Though friends were said to be trying to raise money for him and a Steven Slater Legal Defense Fund on Facebook has already attracted dozens of members, Mr. Slater was placed on a bus around 2:30 p.m. and driven from the courthouse in Queens towards Rikers Island.
At the arraignment on felony charges of reckless endangerment and criminal mischief in a packed room in the basement of criminal court, Mr. Slater’s court-appointed lawyer, Howard Turman, said that Mr. Slater’s activation of the slide was not reckless. He said Mr. Slater followed the proper procedure for activating the slide, checking out the window first to make sure no one was on the tarmac who could be struck by it.
Mr. Turman, of the Legal Aid Society, offered an account of the flight, JetBlue 1052 from Pittsburgh, that he said justified Mr. Slater’s actions. He told reporters that on the ground in Pittsburgh, a female passenger had been verbally and physically abusive to Mr. Slater when he intervened as she squabbled with a male passenger over access to the overhead luggage compartment.
“The woman initially at Pittsburgh slammed the overhead into his head,” Mr. Turman said of Mr. Slater.
A passenger on the flight, Greg Kanczes, said that he saw a large, fresh-looking gash on Mr. Slater’s forehead at the beginning of the flight. “It was about an inch-and-half long, and it was a big red mark or cut,” Mr. Kanczes said by phone Tuesday. “There was no bandage.”
In previous accounts offered by the authorities, Mr. Slater’s main altercation with the passenger had come at the end of the flight, not the beginning, with the passenger pulling a bag out of the overhead compartment that struck Mr. Slater in the head.
Update The law enforcement authorities have declined to identify the passenger and would not say if she had been interviewed. JetBlue said it could not release the passenger’s name because of privacy rules.
Meanwhile, in an interview on the celebrity-news Web site TMZ, a woman who says she was married to Mr. Slater in the 1990s and remains friendly with him said that she talked to Mr. Slater’s ailing mother after his arrest Monday. The woman, Cynthia Susanne, said that Mr. Slater’s mother told her that Mr. Slater said that the passenger had “maliciously” pulled the compartment door down to hit Mr. Slater in the head, but that the altercation had occurred at the end of the flight.
The version offered by Mr. Turman indicates a longer-simmering animus between the two parties.
Mr. Turman said that on the ground at Kennedy, the tension flared up again. When the female passenger tried to get her bag out of the overhead before the crew had given permission and Mr. Slater instructed her to remain seated, Mr. Turman said, the woman “was outraged and cursing” at Mr. Slater, who “wanted to avoid a conflict.”
Law enforcement officials said that after the passenger cursed at Mr. Slater, he grabbed the intercom, cursed her out, bid passengers goodbye, grabbed a beer and activated the inflatable exit chute. In court, an assistant district attorney, Benjamin Martell, said that Mr. Slater said over the plane’s intercom, “Those of you who have shown dignity and respect for 20 years, have a great ride,” before making his final exit.
When asked why Mr. Slater chose to avoid the conflict by taking the emergency slide, Mr. Turman replied, “It was right there.”
No comments:
Post a Comment