Family threatened with jail for not giving up their two-year-old’s seat and kicked off Delta flight
A family was kicked off a Delta flight and threatened with jail for not giving up the seat occupied by their two-year-old son.
The Schear family from Southern California was asked to carry their son on their laps by the staff aboard the Delta airlines flight from Hawaii to Los Angeles, according to the Independent. Brian Schear said that the staff threatened them that they will be sent to jail and have their child taken away if they do not comply. An official told Schear that he had to leave the plane before it took off.
“Then they can remove me off the plane,” he replied.
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“You and your whole family?” the official asked.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” he said.
“So, then, it’s going to be a federal offence,” another agent intervened, “and you and your wife will be in jail and your kids will be —.”
Schear interrupted: “We’re going to be in jail and my kids are going to be what?”.
“It’s a federal offence if you don’t abide by it,” she said.
“I bought that seat,” said Schear. “You’re saying you’re going to give that away to someone else when I paid for that seat. That’s not right.”
His wife Brittany believes they were right, but there was not much they could do.
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“As a mother, you have a one-year-old and two-year-old – it doesn’t matter whether that’s true or false. It put fear in me,” she told ABC.
The problematic seat was initially reserved for the family’s 18-year-old son Mason, who had travelled on an earlier flight. The couple assumed the seat could be used for their younger son. The Delta staff said that they needed the seat, arguing that the flight was overbooked and the seat wasn’t being used by the person it was designated for. When Brian Schear agreed to carry his son on his lap, the staff asked them to leave the plane altogether.
The family was forced to book a hotel room and pay $2,000 for another flight the next day.
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