Nightmare flight: American Airlines first class passenger caught urinating and ‘throwing a bean’ after swallowing 9 Jack & Cokes

Nightmare flight: American Airlines first class passenger caught urinating and ‘throwing a bean’ after swallowing 9 Jack & Cokes

by Gary Leff July 4, 2024

American Airlines Flight 3921 from Chicago O’Hare to Manchester, New Hampshire, near Boston, was diverted to Buffalo on Wednesday after a passenger urinated in the aisle of the Embraer E-170 plane operated by wholly-owned regional carrier Envoy Air.

Niagara Frontier Transit Authority police went to Gate 2 of the Buffalo airport, where the plane eventually arrived. One of the officers boarded the plane and was told by a flight attendant that the man “exposed himself and urinated during the flight,” according to the criminal complaint.

The flight attendant identified the passenger, who was then taken into custody and removed from the plane. Another passenger seated in row 2 had taken photos of the man exposing himself and urinating, and these photos were shared with police.

Once at the police station, the passenger submitted to an interview, although he was Mirandized, during which he explained that:

• He was flying Portland – Chicago – Manchester
• He likes to drink Jack and Coke
• He drank several before his flight out of Portland, and several more during his layover in Chicago.
• He also had several others on the flight from Chicago to Manchester
• He got up during the flight to go to the bathroom and was “making sudden movements” upon his return “due to a medical problem with urination.”

We’ll take “several” to mean “more than two” in each case, which would mean the passenger drank at least nine Jack Cokes.

The 25-year-old man was charged with federal indecent exposure. Because the incident occurred in flight, he is being prosecuted under the District of Columbia Penal Code. DC Code 22-1312 states: “It is unlawful for any person, in public, to expose his genitals or anus in a lewd or indecent manner.”

It seems that this first-class passenger was not a first-class passenger. Nor is this the first time this has happened, or even the first time on American Airlines. A man urinated on a seatmate on an American Airlines flight to Delhi in March. And in one of my favorite cases, an American Airlines passenger had to be told that there was a bathroom on board and that he shouldn’t just use his seat, and this man claimed he wasn’t drunk, “just chewing gum.”

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