uszkanni

Woman talking loudly on cell phone during commuter train trip. Ignored repeated complaints from other pax and warnings from staff. Became verbally abusive. Train was stopped and she was arrested!!

Link here

Clamqueen

Love it!

CyBeR

Am I to understand that:

- A woman was arrested for using her cell phone
- There is apparently some regulation preventing use of cell phones on the train?

How ridiculous. On both counts.

Palal

First, this was not on a commuter train. Second, phone use is not prohibited but pax are asked to be considerate. If she was using it from Oakland as the article suggests, that means she got on at 10PM and was taken off the train at 2PM the next day. Something doesn't make sense.
...?

I think there's more to this story than we'll ever find out.

djs

How ridiculous indeed that someone would completely ignore/disregard repeated requests from train officials to the point where she got herself arrested. I hope she is proud of herself. Hopefully the point that she is above everyone else on the train was worth proving.

CyBeR

Sure, not everyone has manners but seriously; arresting someone for talking on the phone? Preventing people from doing so? What has this world come to? We now deny people their freedoms just so we don't have to listen to them?

uszkanni

Did you even bother to read the article?

To answer your questions:
The woman was arrested for disturbing the peace after becomming verbally abusive/aggressive towards other pax and train staff.

The woman was told by staff not to use her cell phone while the train was moving. There may or may not be a general prohibition on cell phone use (or maybe she was in a "no cell phone use" car) but if she had a problem with staff she should have filed a formal complaint with the RR (Amtrak?); not gotten into an altercation with staff/pax.

Ancien Maestro

Yeah.. 2 sides of the story..

But the main thing was that there was some teeth in law.. arrested is a bit overboard.. maybe a ticket would suffice?

CyBeR

Yes, I did. It seemed to me like the unruliness was again entirely verbal and started only after complaints as to not being allowed to (and let me stress this again) talk on her cell phone.

If she was in a specific "no cell phone carriage", then I retract my comments. But this is not what I read in the article, where it says the staff had made an announcement to not use one's cell phones. Announcements tend not to be carriage-specific.

djs

I guess the bigger question is who is the bigger fool; one who has someone arrested for relatively harmeless behavior or one who gets arrested for said behavior? Again, I hope she is proud of whatever point she was attempting to make.

planemechanic

The the title of this thread is wrong, or at least poorly thought out.

uszkanni

Please take another look at the article. Police were called not because she was simply using a cell phone but because "a passenger was threatening others." Yes, the problem started with the (claim that) the lady was talking "quite loud" on her her cell phone, "continual" [sic] since boarding in Oakland and was "disruptive" to other passengers, but it was the lady in question who escalated the problem to the degree that police were called.

Also, as noted, this trip started at 10pm and the problem continued until 2pm the next day (16 hours, give or take). It is not unlikely that people were trying to sleep for a lot of that time and were being continually disturbed by her loud conversation(s).

The article says that "train personnel had made several announcements not use cell phones while the train was moving." It may be a rule (silly or not) or it may just be policy for trips that run overnight, but there is no justification for becomming threatening or verbally agressvie/abusive.

As Anciens said, it might have been overkill to arrest the pax (depending on what was actually said). As a pax, I would be quite satisfied simply to see these people frog-marched off the train/plane/whatever.

obscure2k

Please continue to follow this thread in the Amtrak Forum.
Thanks..
Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator

AlanB

The only problem is that there is no such rule. Amtrak does operate some trains with a quiet car, where cell phone use is not allowed. But that was not the case here, and there are absolutely no trains were cell phone use is prohibited on the entire train; only a specific car, if that.

So the crew was wrong here if indeed they made such an announcement as indicated in the article.

This is not to suggest that the crew cannot ask someone to cool it on their cell phone if they're talking non-stop, something that isn't actually possible on the train in question as there are areas with no cell service on that route. And certainly if she became belligerent or threatening in any way, the crew is within their rights to call the police to have her removed.

But again, they also cannot order her not to use her cell phone at all, as the announcement that is printed in the story would seem to indicate they did.

Ancien Maestro

Yeah.. I have to agree the title of the thread caused fuel from airplane threads to give legs to this one..

Was interesting eye catcher though..

Looks like its the unruly behavior that caused Amtrak to call in the authorities.