We’ve got more footage of that United Airlines passenger and his ill-fated attempt to get home. Everyone and their mother has viewed the video of 69-year-old doctor David Dao getting manhandled and dragged off a United flight. That’s what happens when they overbook and you won’t give up your seat. To the gulags with you!
Now, one passenger, Joya Griffin Cummings, has uploaded her video of Dao’s interaction with the police prior to his forceful removal. Keep in mind United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz described Dao as “belligerent” and “disruptive.” Somehow this justifies a beatdown by the Chicago Aviation Police.
Nowhere in the video do you see any actions by Dao that warrants any sort of abuse he suffered. Of course, the video doesn’t show what happens in between this video and his beatdown. Maybe Dao suddenly flipped and turned threatening. No witnesses have confirmed such behavior though. The only videos and words we have all show the opposite, i.e. someone calm and rational. Calm, that is, until he gets concussed and comes running back on the plane, mumbling “kill me, kill me” over and over.
Cummings posted the video to her Facebook. She describes Dao as calm, no more irritated than any other travel weary passenger, and in fact, she worried about a confrontation between the police and Dao in such a small space. Cummings wrote on Facebook:
He [Dao] was irritated as any passenger would be, questioning why he was chosen and explaining that he was a doctor and had patients to see in the morning. I was not concerned for my safety, nor that of my toddler’s or for my pregnancy until the police were called aboard our plane to remove him. I was worried about what a physical altercation would entail with us sitting directly behind him and if the officers were armed in a tiny, confined space.
Dao has lawyered up and taken the first steps to a big payday.
David Dao, who has retained a high-powered personal injury lawyer, asked the Cook County Circuit Court for an order requiring United and the city of Chicago to keep all video, cockpit recordings and other reports from the flight, along with the personnel files of the Aviation Department officers who pulled Dao from the plane.
The request was filed a few hours before the Chicago Department of Aviation said it had placed two more officers on administrative leave until further notice as a result of the incident. Another employee already had been placed on leave, and the city said it continues to review the incident.
Awesome, this doctor’s getting paid. Too bad it took a beating and concussion to do so.
He should have gotten off the plane and sued united. You can’t fight the airport police. You just can’t.