An actor Nathan Davis Jr., best known for Marvel’s Runaways and Snowfall, filed a lawsuit against United Airlines this week for $10 million.
What We Know:
- The lawsuit alleged the actor was kicked off of a plane last December after a flight attendant falsely accused him of having a gun, in what he belives was a racially motivated incident.
- In a recent interview with Variety the actor stated “I was extremely fearful. I honestly felt like there was nobody there that had my back. I was the only Black man on the plane. I just honestly felt like my life didn’t matter — I literally felt like this lady was going to take away my life, just by saying that I had a gun”.
- As a result of the incident, Davis’ attorney George Mallory has filed the racial discrimination lawsuit against United Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines, which operates as United Express, on behalf of United and ManaAir.
- The 26-year-old, who is also a TikTok star with 9 million followers on the app, decided to explain publicly why he filed the suit where he is seeking $10 million in damages. “I feel like that I needed to talk about the situation to kind of show people that no matter how much money or fame you have, as a Black man, we’re still gonna have a target on our backs,” he said. “And I don’t want another person to go through this situation who doesn’t have the platform that I have.”
- On the day of the incident, Davis remembers listening to his earphones when a female flight attendant asked him to turn his music down. Davis complied but soon realized other passengers around him were also listening to music with out being reprimanded.
- Then, the flight attendant came back and told him a second and third time to turn his music down but by then Davis had turned his music off just to see what she was really doing.
- When other passengers sitting near him spoke up and said they couldn’t hear his music and felt the attendant was singling him out, the actor began recording what was happening on the plane.
- According to the lawsuit, the flight attendant had the captain make an announcement that the plane would “return to the gate to remove a passenger”. When they reached the gate, one of the airline’s operations supervisors came on board to escort Davis off and the captain allegedly “attempted to forcefully take away [Davis’] cell phone while he recorded the interaction between the parties”.
- When the stunned actor was allowed back onto the plane to retrieve his belongings, the flight attendant announced over the loudspeaker “He has a gun now”, an accusation that Davis claims was false and hadn’t even been brought up before. Fortunately, this part was also captured on video although at the time he was gripped with fear that police would be waiting for him in the terminal.
Fortunately, when he got off the staff was much more compassionate towards him than the attendant, which may have something to do with the fact that by then someone onboard recognized him from his Tik Tok and an agent recognized him as an actor.
