UNDATED (WKRC) – American Airlines has been slammed on social media after a lawyer representing the company suggested the nine-year-old girl, who’s suing the airline, should have known she was being videotaped.
According to The New York Post, a lawyer representing American Airlines suggested in legal papers filed Monday that the nine-year-old girl, who was allegedly filmed by a former flight attendant, should’ve known she was being videotaped.
Per The Post, 37-year-old Estes Carter Thompson lll was arrested after he allegedly installed a camera and filmed several girls between the ages of seven and 14 over the course of several months in 2023. Per the publication, American Airlines wrote in the filing that the nine-year-old should have been aware of the hidden recording device while she used the lavatory.
A post to X by Collin Rugg reporting the news has gone viral and has been viewed over 2.7 million times.
“American Airlines is blaming a 9-year-old girl for being filmed by one of their flight attendants in the plane’s bathroom,” Rugg wrote in the post.
“Any injuries or illnesses alleged to have been sustained by Plaintiff, Mary Doe, were proximately caused by Plaintiff’s own fault and negligence, were proximately caused by Plaintiff’s use of the compromised lavatory, which she knew or should have known contained a visible and illuminated recording device,” lawyers representing American Airlines wrote, per the publication.
The girl’s family is “absolutely livid” with the airline’s suggestion, according to attorney Paul Llewellyn, who is representing them, per The Post.
Speaking to The Post, Attorney Llewellyn said he was “absolutely shocked and I think it’s outrageous.”
“The idea that American Airlines and its lawyers would blame a 9-year-old girl for being filmed, in my opinion, just smacks of desperation and depravity. What on Earth is American Airlines thinking by adopting such a strategy?” Attorney Llewellyn told the publication.
Following Thompson’s arrest, American Airlines said in a statement that it takes “these allegations very seriously.”
The Texas family filed the lawsuit in February, over a year after she was allegedly recorded on a flight to Los Angeles in January of 2023. Thompson was arrested after a 14-year-old girl from North Carolina noticed an iPhone was recording her after she used the lavatory in September of 2023. Investigators allegedly found four instances of the suspect recording a minor while in the bathroom, according to The Post, citing federal prosecutors.
Attorney Llewellyn said that American Airlines didn’t suggest the North Carolina teen was culpable in a separate lawsuit file in December, which remains ongoing.
According to The Post, American Airlines also blamed Thompson in Monday’s legal brief, claiming his alleged acts occurred “outside the course and scope of his employment.”
“American Airline is in “defense mode” for a major lawsuit and public embarrassment,” an X user wrote.
“How in good conscience could they even make such a suggestion?” another wrote.
