You can agree with me or not...but here is my take on the whole thing. This is after getting some more facts this morning as more is now being reported.
Apparently, AFTER the plane boarded,
the 4 sister airline employees (I think it was Republic, but owned by
United) came to the gate and said they
needed to be on THAT flight in order to get to the destination of their
flight the next morning. It never says if they just got off of a recently
landed flight or not, but it does sounds like this was the last flight
of the day going to this particular destination. At that point, passengers on the plane were
offered up to $1000 to voluntarily get off the flight, and take one the
next day. No one volunteered, so they went to their option to have the boarding passes of 4 people voided to make room for the airline employees. I have read that
several factors are considered such as keeping in mind if someone has a
connecting flight, etc....disabled and children traveling alone are
always the very last to be considered. They asked this man SEVERAL times
to get off the plane, and he became agitated and refused to get off the
plane, though he was selected to have his boarding pass voided. He was
forewarned that the police would be called if he continued to refuse,
and he continued...apparently saying he was calling his lawyer, claiming
that they were only removing him because he was Chinese, etc. Two
officers approached him first, and asked him TWICE to accompany them off
the plane. He STILL refused! That is when the 3rd officer approached in
an aggressive manner, and removed him from the seat (note that this 3rd
officer has since been suspended). These officers DID NOT work for
United, but Chicago Airport Police. Somehow, the guy got free from these
guys, and came running back on the plane all bloody from hitting the
armrest, saying over and over that he needed to get home, and even
mumbling "just kill me, just kill me". At this point, staff had to
unboard the entire plane so that authorities could deal with the
situation. All in all, the flight left the gate about 2 hours late, and
the 4 airline employees the seats were being requested for were treated
terribly by the other passengers the entire flight.
Yesterday, we only saw a small snip-it of the altercation, and were fed incomplete facts. The man should have left the plane in a civil manner when originally
asked to, and then respectfully ask to speak to someone in charge to
work out how he would get home, compensation, etc. Instead, his defiance
lead to drama. Do I think excessive force may have been used? Yes! I'm
not refuting that. Just saying that if the man followed what he was
being told, this would have been avoided. It says right there in the
Contract of Carriage when you buy your ticket...that you agree to...that
you may be prevented from flying for various cases, including
overbooking. Do I agree with overbooking? No. That still does not change
the fact that this could have been avoided if the man simply acted
civil in the first place!