Drunk Passenger 'Body-Slammed' Flight Attendant Allegedly, Refused To Stop Filming On Plane

A flight attendant was allegedly “body-slammed” by a drunk passenger on a Qantas Airways flight when the former tried to stop the man from filming her, the District Court of Western Australia heard Monday.

Patrick Walters, 48, was charged with assaulting Karyn Dwyer, a member of an aircraft crew, in an incident that took place in April 2017, just as the flight was about to take off from Port Hedland to Brisbane, Australia, Perth Now reported.

It all started when Walters, who was assigned the exit row seat, was found missing. Anxious flight attendants started searching for him, only to find him emerging from the bathroom. When he was asked to verify his identification, he revealed he had swapped his boarding pass with one of his colleagues. They also took note of the fact that Walters seemed considerably intoxicated.

When his colleague in question tried to board the plane, they discovered that he too was heavily drunk. The colleague entered into an argument with the flight attendants and Walters made his way to the front of the plane in order to “lend assistance,” Stephen Ainscough, another passenger who witnessed the confrontation, told the court via video chat.

The flight attendants requested Walters to return to his seat, but he did not comply.

“He (Walters) was doing as he pleased. He was not listening,” Ainscough said.

Instead, he started filming Dwyer with his phone. He was asked to stop filming multiple times owing to the fact that the flight attendant was wearing a government-issued security clearance guard, which could not be posted on public forums like social media. When Walters did not listen, Dwyer reached out toward his phone and tried to click the red button, which caused Walters to become aggressive.

“There was pushing, a scuffle over the phone and they went backwards into the galley. He was forcing her backwards,” Ainscough said.

The witness said he could not see what happened next but could hear the flight attendant screaming. After a while, he found her “shaking, white - she was in shock.”

The court also heard from Laura Norton, another flight attendant present on the flight when the incident happened. She said her colleague left no scope for any doubts as to her objection of the passenger’s actions from the start.

“She was being very direct. She was getting very agitated with him filming," Norton said.

Norton added that she witnessed the alleged body-slam. "There was a struggle for the phone and then she was pushed up against the galley ... with his full body weight on top of her,” she said, Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Doctor Dale Van Der Mescht, who examined Dwyer, also testified corroborating Norton’s account of the incident. He said Dwyer had shoulder pain and movement limitations which later required physiotherapy.

The incident delayed the flight for more than three hours. A business class passenger had to intervene to bring the confrontation to an end. Finally, the ground crew escorted the two drunk men off the plane.

Walter’s lawyer Stephen Stewart argued that his client had every right to film inside the plane’s cabin as there was no law prohibiting him from doing so.

“What he’s doing is not interfering with the safe conduct of the flight,” Stewart said.

The trial is currently ongoing.