Ma kicked off jet in dustup over stroller
A BOSTON MOM says she feels hurt and intimidated after she and her 4-month-old baby were booted from an American Airlines flight to New York after she asked for her stroller back during a long delay.
Briana Williams, 24, said she was flying from Atlanta to visit family in Brooklyn and Queens when her nightmare commute began on Aug. 21.
The Harvard Law student reached out to the Daily News after seeing a story about how New York activist Tamika Mallory was kicked off an American Airlines following an argument over her seat assignment.
Williams said she plans to take legal action so pilots can’t eject someone on a whim.
“This type of unregulated discretion is a segue into discriminatory policy,” she said.
“The pilot put me in a potentially dangerous situation with law enforcement as a young, black woman, saying that I was a ‘threat.’ This type of rhetoric paralyzes the African-American community, and I want to ensure that policies are put in place that regulate the pilot’s discretionary abilities.”
Williams said her two-hour flight to LaGuardia Airport was delayed for more than five hours due to bad weather.
Flight 1678 returned to the gate and passengers were ordered to leave the plane. Williams asked airline staff to return the stroller she checked at the gate.
When airline staff refused and Williams refused to budge, the pilot was called. He ordered her to exit the plane. She refused to leave without the stroller. The pilot got angry and called police to kick her off, according to Williams and witnesses.
The airline offered her 25,000 flying miles because the crew’s “behavior deviated from standard.” She declined.
Airline spokesman Ross Feinstein said discrimination is never tolerated.