A woman who said she was raped during a recent flight claims the man responsible still hasn't been arrested.
Aubrey Lane, a 31-year-old married mother from Colorado, said she was assaulted while on a red-eye flight from Phoenix to New York this past June. The man who sat next to her on that flight appeared to be drunk.
"My first thought was this guy's drunk. He was super chatty,' Lane said in an interview with the Dallas Morning News. 'I've flown a lot. I'm used to people saying hello. This is the most anyone has sat down and started talking to me."
Even though the man seemed drunk, Lane said flight attendants continued to serve him alcohol throughout the flight. A few hours into it, she got up to use the bathroom.
She said the man got up and followed her into the bathroom where he raped her.
Lane said she immediately reported the incident to the flight attendants who moved her to a seat at the back of the plane.
"I was feeling overwhelmed," she said. "All of a sudden, I was thrown in a middle seat, bawling. On top of being sad and hurt and scared, I was also embarrassed."
When they landed in New York, authorities were called to meet the plane at the gate — but they only took Lane to the hospital.
Her attacker wasn't taken into custody and today she still doesn't even know his name. Because the alleged raped happened in the air, FBI has to investigate and prosecute.
Lane said she's looking to sue American Airlines for letting the drunk man board the plane and continuing to serve him drinks.
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Lane said American responded to her attorneys with a letter this past December and called her allegations a "nuisance claim." They offered her a $5,000 payout, which she has not accepted.
"I'm coming out now because [American] hasn't made it evident it wants to change this," Lane said. "What's going to stop this from happening again unless I make a big fuss about it?"
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