Wrongfully Imprisoned Passenger Sues Airline

American Airlines is the latest institution bearing the appellation “American” to forego due-process and trample the rights of individual Americans—suggests a lawsuit brought against the airline by an Arizona man. 

Michael Lowe, a Grand Canyon tour guide, states he was held in a small, overcrowded jail in Tucumcari, N.M., for more than two weeks because Fort Worth-based American Airlines incorrectly provided his name to police, who’d requested the passenger list of a flight Lowe had taken a year prior.

Lowe asserts his wrongful incarceration—during which he was forced to sleep on a concrete floor he describes as smelling of urine and feces—cost him thousands of dollars in lost tourism business. 

Though later cleared of the crime, Lowe maintains the tribulation of arrest, imprisonment, neglect, and denial of due-process has shaken his identity to the core and cast a pall over his view of the world. Lowe further states the experience has afflicted him with anxiety and depression. 

Lowe was waiting for a connecting flight at DFW when a break-in occurred at one of the airport’s duty-free stores. Police investigating the robbery used surveillance footage to determine that the suspected thief had boarded American Airlines flight 2248 to Reno—the same flight on which Lowe was traveling. 

Police asked American Airlines for flight 2248’s passenger manifest yet received only a single name from the carrier—that of Michael Lowe. The subsequent issuance of a warrant for Lowe’s arrest instantiated a genuinely remarkable achievement of apathy and stupidity on the parts of multiple police departments and judicial bodies. 

More than a year later, while traveling to Quay County in New Mexico, Lowe was arrested by local police investigating a disturbance. Officers checked Lowe’s I.D., noted the warrant, and conveyed him to prison where he was held for eight days before seeing a judge, and another nine days thereafter. On the 17th day, he was released without explanation. 

Lowe states he promptly contacted detectives at DFW Airport, who informed him his arrests had been based on information provided  by American Airlines. Investigators compared Lowe’s photograph with surveillance footage of the suspect and cleared him of any involvement in the crime.

“American breached its duty of care to Mr. Lowe by failing to comply with the search warrant, and instead providing only Mr. Lowe’s information to law enforcement,” Lowe’s lawsuit alleges. “American Airlines should have provided its entire flight manifest as ordered by the warrant, or a list of all individuals who matched a certain description.” 

FMI: www.billofrightsinstitute.org/primary-sources/bill-of-rights, www.american.com