Area teacher alleges she was held captive during Greek vacation
A Titus County, Texas, teacher claims in a federal lawsuit that she was imprisoned in a ship’s infirmary, threatened with Greek prison and forced to barricade herself in a cabin during an international educational tour last year.
Carolyn Criss, a teacher with Chapel Hill Independent School District in Titus County, Texas, filed suit June 22 with the help of Daingerfield, Texas, lawyer Ty Wilson of the Nix, Patterson & Roach firm. Named as defendants are EF Institute for Cultural Exchange Inc.; EF Education First International Ltd.; EF Educational Foundation for Foreign Study; Signum International AG; and Celestyal Cruises Ltd.
“To help sell its product of educational tours, defendant EF partners with school districts throughout the United States of America,” the complaint states. “The benefits of these tours, as represented by defendant EF, are that they offer an affordable way for students and parents to go
on international trips that primarily focus on providing an educational and culturally immersive experience.”
The school district at which Criss teaches partnered with EF, and that led Criss to purchase a spot for herself and her son on the “Italy and Spain” tour from June 11, 2017, to June 26, 2017, according to the complaint.
“Plaintiff also made the additional purchase through defendant EF of a three-day Greek cruise,” which would occur during the final days of the tour.
Criss claims she, her son and about 40 other members of their tour group departed from Dallas to Madrid, Spain, on June 11, 2017, and that the group embarked for the Greek cruise as scheduled on June 23, 2017, and that things went horribly wrong during their second night on the ship.
Criss and her son were enjoying a party-like atmosphere and Karaoke inside the ship’s “Selena Bar,” the evening of June 24, 2017, the complaint states. Despite a policy against it, alcoholic drinks were allegedly being served to passengers under 21 and no security staff were on site.
“Predictably, this unsupervised and combustible situation produced a violent brawl between passengers,” the complaint alleges. “Plaintiff, sitting near the fight with her son and horribly astonished at the complete lack of response, quickly got hold of the nearest employee, a waitress, and desperately pleaded for ship security. As a reply, the waitress gave the plaintiff a sobering reprimand to ‘stop asking for security because there is none.’”
As Criss watched the melee, she was horrified to watch as a woman who tried to stop the confrontation was beaten, “with one blow being so violent that it forced the woman’s teeth to break through the bottom of her jaw,” the complaint alleges.
Criss was allegedly swept into the fray when she tried to help the injured woman and was knocked to the floor.
“Within this tumult, plaintiff’s arm was injured, both her ankles were painfully twisted tearing her ligaments, and her knees and lower back were severely traumatized,” according to the complaint.
Others in Criss’ tour group and her son came to her aid and asked crew members for medical attention, but Criss allegedly languished on the floor of the bar for nearly an hour before being taken to the ship’s infirmary. While in the infirmary during the early hours of June 25, 2017, Criss was told she would not receive medical care unless she signed documents releasing the cruise line and its employees from liability.
When Criss refused to sign the documents, ship’s representative Alexandros Vasimposis allegedly “became unhinged and violently erratic.” Criss alleges Vasimposis’ anger fumed for hours in the infirmary, with him allegedly taking documents from Criss’ hands and throwing them across the room when she declined to sign.
When Criss informed Vasimposis that she was returning to her cabin without treatment, “Mr. Vasimposis responded by threatening to have the Greek navy intervene if plaintiff remained noncompliant.”
“He instructed that, upon him notifying the navy, plaintiff would likely find herself wasting away within an Athenian prison, which was described to plaintiff in squalid detail,” the complaint states.
Criss alleges that Vasimposis forcibly refused to let her leave the infirmary for some time but eventually let her go. Members of the ship’s staff allegedly used “continual intimidation and coercion” to force Criss to return to the infirmary.
“This visit to the infirmary saw an escalation in Mr. Vasimposis’ depravity. He resorted to picking up a syringe filled with an unidentified substance and attempted to inject plaintiff with it despite her pleas to stop,” the complaint states.
Vasimposis allegedly threatened Criss with expulsion from the ship and separation from her son. Criss managed to flee the infirmary and barricaded herself in her cabin until debarking from the ship June 26, 2017.
Criss alleges the physical and psychological injuries she suffered have left her unable to work and have left her and her son in need of counseling. Criss claims injuries to her ankle have decreased her mobility and required surgical and rehabilitative intervention.
The complaint accuses Celestyal Cruises of negligence, false imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress and breach of contract. The complaint alleges the EF defendants are guilty of negligence, negligent infliction of emotional distress, breach of fiduciary duty and breach of contract.
Criss is seeking damages from all defendants for past and future physical pain and mental anguish, loss of earning capacity, disfigurement, physical impairment and past and future medical expenses. Criss is also asking for exemplary damages from Celestyal.
The case is assigned to U.S. District Judge Robert Schroeder III in the Texarkana Division of the Eastern District of Texas. None of the defendants have yet filed a response.