An American Airlines flight attendant has been accused of trapping a mother and her toddler in an airplane bathroom because she thought they were a terrorist threat. The suspects, 36-year-old Yazz Giraldo and her 3-year-old son, are the wife and child of 44-year-old Ali Moghaddam, a former Federal Bureau of Investigation agent. The incident reportedly occurred because the parents spoke Farsi to their young children during the flight.
Giraldo, who is of Middle Eastern and Latin descent, claims that she and the flight attendant disagreed over which bathroom she and her young child could use and things escalated from there. According to court documents from a new lawsuit obtained by the New York Post, the flight attendant accused her of suspected terrorism. Now, the family is suing American Airlines.
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It all started with a toddler who needed to go to the bathroom.
The incident happened back in September on a flight from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Long Island, New York. During the flight, her son needed to use the bathroom, Giraldo told the Post, so she headed to the facility in first class, which was closest to her seat. She and Moghaddam were separated on the plane.
"Everybody else was using it," Giraldo told the newspaper.
But according to her, a flight attendant quickly stopped her from using that bathroom without any explanation. She moved to the back of the plane, where her husband sat and changed the baby's diaper. At that point, Giraldo said another flight attendant approached and said she could use either bathroom.
She did what any mom would do.
As the Post reported, her son was "holding himself, he was about to lose it." To avoid an accident, she took the little boy to the bathroom. The first flight attendant again tried to stop her, but Giraldo went in anyway. She reportedly felt like she was locked in when she closed the door.
"I closed the door, when I'm inside the bathroom I start hearing the noise, 'tick, tick, tick,'" she said of the sound of the door locking. "I freaked out. I was already under so much stress. … I started to panic, I banged on the door a few times and I said, 'Let me out of here.'"
Giraldo said American Airlines was racist toward her.
While in the bathroom, she lost track of time, and once she was finally released, she was so worked up she was trembling. After getting out of the bathroom, Giraldo alleges that a supervisor on the plane verbally attacked her.
"The pilot decided to put the plane under terrorist attack warning because of you," the supervisor allegedly claimed.
"I immediately knew it was racism. I immediately knew I was being discriminated against," she said.
Her husband, a former prosecutor and FBI Agent, had no idea what was happening to his wife and child.
Moghaddam said he was unaware of what was happening at the front of the plane, but he was appalled by the entire situation.
"I dedicated about a decade of my life to public service, to protecting the community. Joint Terrorism Task Force, undercover, S.W.A.T., all of this … for my family to be labeled as terrorist and be marched off a plane just because we want to change a diaper?" he said, according to the Post.
Upon exiting the plane, Moghaddam asked to be taken to the FBI substation, and when officers saw his credentials, they let the family go within 15 minutes.
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Being labeled with the word 'terrorist' was devastating to the family.
Moghaddam said he couldn't believe the airline called his family terrorists. "For me there's certain terms that have a history and connotation that is very negative," he said. "That word terrorism is unique, especially considering all my sacrifices … you don't throw that around."
American Airlines told the Post it is reviewing the lawsuit.
"American strives to provide a positive and welcoming experience to everyone who travels with us and we take allegations of discrimination very seriously," the airline noted in a statement to the newspaper.
