If there’s even an ounce of truth to this story, then this is just terrible. The union representing Air France’s flight attendants is claiming that some Air France flight attendants were detained in Buenos Aires for up to six hours for not upgrading a politician’s daughter to business class.
This incident unfolded after Air France flight 228 from Paris to Buenos Aires on October 29, 2017. Allegedly a passenger requested an upgrade to business class and was denied. Later that passenger asked to change her seats due to the “inappropriate behavior” of a fellow passenger, and that request was accommodated. As the crew later found out, the passenger in question happened to be the daughter of a former Deputy Minister of Justice, and now a Buenos Aires magistrate.
Here’s what happened next, according to Aviation24:
After landing and following a complaint from the same passenger, part of the crew was forced to go to the airport police station. After staying there for six hours, the crew was released, but at the hotel, an injunction was handed over to the crew to report to the Buenos Aires court the next morning at 8:30.
The next morning the crew was sent to a courtyard and the purser was separated from the rest of the crew and locked in a 1 m2 room without the possibility to sit nor drink and eat for several hours. Two guards were constantly watching him.
After several hours, he could finally speak to a lawyer to file a complaint about his treatment. The other crew members were heard for many hours, but the purser was interrogated only at 20:00. Next to the judge, the father of the passenger was also present to interrogate the crew members, in Spanish.
All the flight attendants ended up being released without charges.
As of now all we have is the crew and union’s side of the story. I hope there’s more to the story because this would be a shocking abuse of power, but I’m not holding my breath…
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