Originally Posted by
pdquick
No, thank you. I don't want to live in a world where law enforcement can exercise any whim it wants.
But in this case, law enforcement had a lawful request to remove someone from a corporation's private property. It may not have been fair, but United does in fact have the legal right to screw you over in exactly this way. They have to get you to your destination on the next available flight, and they have to pay you CASH if you request it in lieu of the vouchers they can offer volunteers.
But apparently this guy ran back into the aircraft four times. There are only so many ways to restrain and remove a non-cooperative human being from a place where he is an unwelcome quest. It's easy to be outraged, but what would you have had the police officers do instead, exactly?
I have looked and looked and I haven't seen any actual credible report about how his face got bloody, or how he came to be holding on to a curtain whimpering "I want to go home."
They have the right to deny boarding, but that does not imply the right to forcibly remove a person from the plane who has already boarded. We'll probably get to see how a judge and jury defines the word "boarding", but any plain reading of that word (including how the gate agents use it) means entering the aircraft--maybe even the jetbridge given that the "boarding" happens at the scanner--and taking one's seat.
The video I saw made it quite clear how his face got bloody--it came into contact with the armrest after the LEO's handling of him resulted in a loss of physical control. There was the beginnings of bleeding when they were dragging him (when his glasses were displaced), and it continued to bleed, spilling out of his mouth.
As to property owners having the right to eject trespassers, well, not so fast. This man had a right to be there, and was indeed invited to be there. He was not doing anything to cause the airline to rescind that invitation except being high up on a list he was never shown. What the pax heard was "random" even if that is not what was said. He had no expectation of being forcibly removed from the airplane, so of course he is going to stand his ground. The airline is not someone's living room, and the man was not loitering. They have provided a public accommodation for which he paid and was invited to use.