DOES SHE HAVE A CASE OR NOT?

PASSENGER WHO WOKE TO FIND HERSELF ALONE ON PLANE SUES AIRLINE FOR FALSE IMPRISONMENT
　
Mail Online
May 28, 2010
　
An air passenger who woke to find herself locked in an empty plane is suing an airline for false imprisonment after staff failed to wake her upon arrival.
　
Ginger McGuire, 36, fell asleep on a United Express flight to Philadelphia on Tuesday, and claims she woke up to find she was alone on the plane.
　
Miss McGuire said she paced the aisles for about 15 minutes until a locked door opened and police demanded identification.

'Waking up to an empty airplane and not being able to get out - it was very horrifying,' Miss McGuire said.
　
She has filed a lawsuit against United and Trans States, alleging negligence, false imprisonment and distress.
　
'For a crew to leave her there and lock her is beyond a gross abuse,' her lawyer Geoffrey Fieger said.
　
McGuire said she simply fell asleep after a long trip that stretched from Detroit to suburban Washington before arriving in Philadelphia.
　
United Airlines said it was investigating her claims. The Transportation Security Administration is also investigating.

A Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman said there was no regulation about leaving someone asleep on a plane.

EDITOR’S NOTE: One reader commented, "She was there for 15 mins after she woke but we do not know how long after the plane landed. She could have been there for a couple of hours before she woke up." Another reader found it incredulous that she did not wake up with all "the commotion of people getting up and removing belongings from the overhead bins, then people going up and down the very narrow aisles, where one cannot help but brush against their fellow passengers."