SAN DIEGO, Oct. 6 (UPI) -- A San Diego woman who says she was humiliated after being removed from a Southwest Airlines flight filed a discrimination lawsuit against the carrier Thursday.
Irum Abbasi, a Muslim woman wearing a hijab, was led off the airplane when a flight attendant thought she overheard Abbasi say "it's a go" on her mobile phone in March. Abbasi says she was telling a Verizon representative, "I've got to go."
Shortly after her removal from the plane, Southwest determined the woman posed no security risk and offered her a seat on the next flight and a travel voucher.
She was not allowed back on her original flight "because the crew was 'uncomfortable' with her on the plane, and the captain had discretion to make that final call. Shocked and humiliated, Plaintiff stood motionless as she watched her plane take off without her," the lawsuit said.
Because she missed her original flight, Abbasi said she was delayed from conducting an experiment she had set up at San Jose State University where she is a graduate student, The Dallas Morning News reported Thursday.
She "will ... have no further practical opportunities to conduct this research," the lawsuit alleged.
