An American Airlines flight attendant suspected a father traveling with his teenage daughter was engaged in human trafficking, creating an unsavory situation when the flight landed in Charlotte.
Dad Traveling With 13-Year-Old Daughter Suspected Of Trafficking Her By American Airlines Flight Attendant
Francisco De Jesus was traveling with his 13-year-old daughter on AA from Seattle (SEA) to Charlotte (CLT). They were traveling to North Carolina to celebrate the graduation of his eldest daughter.
Onboard the aircraft, he rose to use the lavatory. When he returned, he noticed his daughter had American Airlines kiddie wings pinned on her. His daughter explained that a flight attendant had approached her while he was in the lavatory and asked her a series of questions, including:
- Are you ok?
- Where are you going?
- Who are going to meet?
Beyond beverage service, there was no more interaction during the flight.
When the flight landed in Charlotte, the two were met by a number of people. De Jesus explained:
“As we’re deplaning, we’re greeted by several individuals. One of them who introduced himself as the head of security for the Charlotte International Airport.”
The two were led through the terminal before finally being taken aside. There, De Jesus was told that a flight attendant on his flight was concerned he was a human trafficker. He was asked a number of questions and it “quickly became clear” he was not a trafficker. The two were soon on their way.
American Airlines issued the following statement on the incident:
“At American, the safety and security of our customers and team members is our top priority. Our frontline team members are trained to navigate a variety of safety issues, including recognizing the potential signs of human trafficking. We strive to create a positive, welcoming environment for everyone who travels with us and apologize for any misunderstanding that may have occurred.”
You can watch his interview with the local NBC affiliate in Seattle below:
De Jesus comes across to me as quite reasonable and I think he is asking precisely the right question.
How does American Airlines train its flight attendants to recognize potential human traffickers? What signs are they looking for?
Here, he mentions that his daughter had a mobile phone and was watching a movie on an iPad. There is no indication she appeared anxious and
The US Department of Homeland Security offers a number of signs to identify victims of trafficking, including:
- Is the person disoriented or confused, or showing signs of mental or physical abuse?
- Does the person have bruises in various stages of healing?
- Is the person fearful, timid, or submissive?
- Does the person show signs of having been denied food, water, sleep, or medical care?
- Does s the person often in the company of someone to whom he or she defers? Or someone who seems to be in control of the situation, e.g., where they go or who they talk to?
- Does the person appear to be coached on what to say?
The answer to every one of those questions appears to be no.
These stories interest me because it cannot be that every time a father travels with his teenage daughter he faces the chance of being detained simply for traveling with his daughter. As an avid traveler who hopes to raise a future avid traveler, I am already planning solo trips with my daughter in the years to come. How often will I be accused of being a predator or trafficker simply because I am traveling with a young girl?
From a legal and civil liberties perspective, I reject the notion of deference to erring on the side of caution. Unless there are very specific signs of distress, it is not right to accuse a man of trafficking a young woman “just in case.”
CONCLUSION
A father faced an uncomfortable situation at Charlotte Douglas Airport after an American Airlines flight attendant accused him of being a human trafficker. No doubt this was also distressing to his 13-year-old daughter. While I detest human trafficking to the degree that I support capital punishment for those guilty of such trafficking, I am deeply uncomfortable with how easy it is to accuse a man of such a heinous act. I believe American Airlines owes it to De Jesus in particular but all of us to explain how flight attendants are trained to recognize and report suspected man traffickers.
(H/T: PYOK)
It’ll never be an issue for you Matthew. You are white.
That may well be…considering my daughter is also white. I did not discuss the racial element since De Jesus’ daughter was never pictured, but I wonder if she is mixed race and may have looked very different than her dad. That would not at all excuse the conduct of the AA flight attendant, absent any proof the girl appeared to be trafficked, but I agree that minorities and mixed-race families appear to face more scrutiny.
However, I know of at least one white man with a white daughter was accused of the same thing, so I would be careful before making sweeping generalizations.
My brother in law is white, my sister is asian. Their children look much more like her than him. He’s been approached many times by ‘concerned’ people.
Not entirely true. Since my daughter was five (now 15) we have been questioned by TSA on a number of occasions.
We have had basic questions by TSA to our kids as well when at the checkpoint. Entirely appropriate there because they have to confirm identity (in theory) and don’t have the benefit of a picture ID to do so with most children. It’s always been perfunctory and not accusatory.
Totally different scenario than being detained on the jetway and interrogated by law enforcement. That is a step that should be taken only with significant evidence, and really shouldn’t be left to FAs. They simply don’t have the training necessary, through no fault of their own.
The reality is that actual trafficking inside the United States is pretty rare according to those who actually research the issue, and it’s often conflated with prostitution, which while related isn’t the same exactly. And I sincerely doubt many actual traffickers use airlines to move people because of the risks.
And yes there is no doubt that white people get the benefit of the doubt much more often. This is America.
Good overview
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/01/children-sex-trafficking-conspiracy-epidemic/620845/
Actually, during the last border asylum crisis, there were reports of thousands of sexually abused children being trafficked by Latinos.
Professional traffickers, of course, can employ mules to avoid any type of profiling including utilizing caucasian women to smuggle contraband or even to accompany children. I read a story on a hacker forum 25 years ago about a woman who smuggled contraband in a boombox and the USA border patrol started fiddling with the radio to see if it worked and she on the spot cried:
“YOU BROKE MY RADIO!!!”
and threw a huge hissy fit and demanded they pay to repair it. They quickly sent her on her way and she framed a letter from the USBP apologizing for “breaking her radio”.
That being said, I like to research the effectiveness of particular measures at achieving their objective versus the inconvenience to the innocent and googled and didn’t find any incidents of an FA spotting a child sex trafficker although a quick thinking gate agent spotted something suspicious about two teen’s tickets and prevented them from being lured by some stalker.
In my own case, I sort of exploit my lovely daughter for the attention in that we (and particularly she) is dressed up for the flight and I ask for coloring books and toys and the FA’s are overjoyed to provide them and if some of that warmth spills over on me, I’m not going to say no to it.
Matt, I’m sure as an attorney you’re smarter than me on this but I suggest you get a bank notarized letter from your wife, annually, explaining that you travel often and she gives your consent to do so lest some passport or gate agent ask about it. I think the airlines probably do not give out specifics on what the FA’s are training to look for in that counter-measures by bad actors would be utilized against them.
To AA team – just give them full refund and training again your crew about this. This is very embarrassing!
As a parent AND grandparent, I am grateful — and relieved — the flight attendant was pro-active. Last summer, I boarded a flight at IAD with my young-teen granddaughter to Atlanta —- both international HUBS. I was not offended that the TSA agent asked her several questions to be sure I was not trafficking her. Who is this? What is her name? Did you travel from somewhere before Dulles? Why would anyone be offended that TSA agents or airline reps are on the lookout for human trafficking? That father should have been GRATEFUL!
How grateful should one be if the flight attendant or TSA agents aren’t satisfied with the answers to these questions?
Anyone who is actually concerned about trafficking should demand the USA secures the Southern border immediately.
Yet the Biden Administration does nothing. I wonder why?
This shouldn’t be an issue since Trump built an impenetrable wall
Don’t you worry, your boy Pudding Fingers aka Tiny D will close that Mexico/Florida border as soon as he gets into office. ‘Murica!
Every year when I take my airline’s mandatory trafficking training, I just think that there’s no way I’d ever try to save someone’s life even if I have strong evidence they are being trafficked. I’d just end up on one of these blogs getting criticized or I’d get fired by the airline if I was wrong. It’s not worth the risk to myself to try to get someone rescued. If he/she is being trafficked, they’ll need to ask for help from someone else.
@jm: You are dodging the issue and shoring yourself in needless self-pity.
The question is two-fold. First, how are flight attendants trained (what specific signs are they looking for)? Second, what signs were witnessed with this particular girl that made it necessary to contact law enforcement?
Suspected victim has no control of travel or i.d. documents, no freedom of movement or social interactions (e.g. being escorted to the lavatory, being silent or mentally shut down), doesn’t know where they are going and cannot articulate travel plans, child and adult appear to be unacquainted or child appears intimidated in the presence of the guardian, or guardian is ill-prepared to care for the child.
This is the AA watchlist?
We have an exchange student this year from Spain. My wife and I are white while our female student has a much darker complexion. I have taken her through the Clear line with me while my wife goes through the normal PreCheck line. We’ve flown eight times and I think she’s been politely questioned two or three times about who she was traveling with.
TSA does that all the time. Not stupid FAs. My kids are teenagers and when they travel with me and my wife TSA agent always ask them their names and who they are traveling with. They have to a answer those questions. If anyone would be suspicious it should be TSA and since they weren’t the FA had no business in making their lives miserable. I hope he/she gets back to class to redo this part of the training.
Ohhhh FAs!!!!!! The only thing they don’t do is to be a FA. Most of them are simply disgraceful!!!
As a parent AND grandparent, I am grateful — and relieved — the flight attendant was pro-active. Last summer, I boarded a flight at IAD with my young-teen granddaughter to Atlanta —- both international HUBS. I was not offended that the TSA agent asked her several questions to be sure I was not trafficking her. Who is this? What is her name? Did you travel from somewhere before Dulles? Why would anyone be offended that TSA agents or airline reps are on the lookout for human trafficking? That father should have been GRATEFUL!
I am in my sixties and I’ve never been a father, but a good friend of mine told about a time his daughter got hurt in some accident around the house and he took her to the local emergency room. He said that the staff there took him aside and started asking questions because they thought he might have hurt the girl himself. He said it felt strange to be questioned like that when he was innocent, but he appreciated their concern because sometimes a father does indeed hurt his daughter. As an outsider and a non-father, I would think that many fathers would be grateful that someone cared enough to ask questions for the safety of the girl.
Some people are soooooo by the book. I once had a kidney stone and while driving I had an acute renal colic which for those who never had one is rated one of the highest pains humans can have. Luckily I was close to a hospital and was able to drive there and run into the ER. I was almost fainting with the pain and before the nurse give me morphine she said she needed to ask some questions including if I felt safe at my home and if anyone ever wanted to hurt me. WTF!!!! Give me the f….ing morphine!!!
I never wish anyone harm, but the thought of you with a painful kidney stone. Hhhhmmm. Have a nice day Santastico, from this stupid, disgraceful F/A. Now off to enjoy my gelato.
@Flyer1: I had 3 of those acute renal colics during my life and survived them all. I am not a snowflake. BTW, my next door neighbor is a FA for Delta and the nicest person I ever met. But unfortunately, there are disgraceful ones. I hope you are not one of those. Enjoy your gelato but careful with the cone as it may hurt to come out.
RjB you are soooo right and billybob your buddy JOe tore it down…DAAAAA pay attention
Yet another post by the single dumbest poster on all the travel blogs…”dee” ladies and gentlemen!
I would rather be safe than sorry. How many fathers out there who will never see their daughters again thanks to sex trafficking who would wish someone noticed something and spoke up. Obviously there are some criteria they use to see but if they were just to tell everyone what they were then obviously sex traffickers would just change tactics or work to avoid those telltale signs.
Another barbaric solution to a far more complex problem.
For example, If people have too many guns and kill we need to have others in place with weapons to counter them. And we need metal detectors everywhere we go to prevent them. Schools, sporting events, soon…shopping malls.
To counter human trafficking, we need to question and harass any father with a child. Guilty until proven innocent. Assume the worst.
“It’s better to be safe than sorry.”
The reality is that if we actually provided and made accessible a decent level of education across the country, one that’s free and for all…the problem would solve itself. Until then we just react to it like animals. And be damned the idea of evolving as a society.
This guy was under no obligation to talk to the police/authorities.
Citizens don’t have to talk to the police.
You cannot be detained unless you have committed or are suspected of actually committed a crime.
Police detain citizens illegally all the time. It’s a lawsuit waiting to happen….
Don’t be so quick to criticize. You don’t know what their trainng is for a reason; it would be much easier to foil observers if traffickers know what to prepare for. And don’t rely on TSA, like they aren’t sometimes so overwhelmed they could miss something. If this criticism makes FAs hesitant to call attention to possible trafficking and even ONE child is harmed, how much worse is that than the inconvenience by this complaining parent? Don’t forget, you are only hearing HIS side of why he shouldn’t have been flagged. He’s not likely to admit he or his child did anything to cause the notice of this FA. I’m proud that this FA took the time and concern to notice, even if in this case it was not confirmed.
This type of occurrence is the result of the common combination of idiots and fears. The people who attempt to teach FAs how to screen for trafficking behavior are unfortunately idiots. The fears that we have about children being trafficked lead to a “any approach is a good approach” mindset to attempts to combat the problem.
One aspect of screening a large number of individuals with what are essentially hastily taught profiling techniques is that the false positives will dramatically exceed the true positives. Stated differently, the techniques being taught if applied as instructed will make a FA much more likely to accuse an innocent person than to identify the guilty. Do they tell the FAs this in the training? I’ll bet they don’t.
Next, the commonly taught techniques are going to be applied by people who expectedly have conscious and unconscious biases, and yet I’ll guess that the amount of training that goes into teaching FAs about identifying and mitigating their biases in this regard is minimal, at best.
If I’m right about these two aspects, the expected result is that a large number of those identified by FAs as trafficking suspects will turn out to involve wrongly accused minorities.
For those who understand the impact of bias, prevalence, incidence, sensitivity, and specificity to screening techniques, the real world results that we see are mathematical certainties and in no way surprising.
Maybe flight attendants should be trained like cops, and policemen these days. Handcuffs and all. But nice cops.