Eric Murdock sues United Airlines over an alleged "race baiting" event. The former NBA player is depicted in action for Los Angeles Cliipers December 2, 1999.
[Tom Hauck / Allsport]
A retired NBA star was escorted by a United Airlines flight this summer after a confrontation with a race-baiting flight attendant over swapped seats, he claims in a lawsuit.
Former Utah Jazz punisher Eric Murdock, 50, who once held a league record for stealing, flies home to Newark Airport from a Las Vegas conference on Flight 1537 in July when he asked to sit in the empty emergency exit row behind him with His son, who sat in another row, said in a $ 10 million Brooklyn Federal Court lawsuit he filed with a passenger.
Flyers told him that the line cost a "premium" price, but did not say how much Murdock claimed in legal papers. When a ticket passenger turned out for the place just before departure and offered to swap seats with the 6-foot-1 baller, he accepted.
But an irate companion did not have it, Murdock claims.
rude and dismissive "companion, whom Murdock simply identified as" Jane Doe ", ordered Murdock back to his assigned seat, claiming that the row had to be empty.
But 30 minutes in the ride, she allowed a white woman to sit there and refused to explain the disagreement to Murdock, who is black. The escort was white.
Another passenger, Brenda Williams, who is black and who did not know Murdock before the plane, asked why Jane Doe was so rude to Murdock. It was not her business, accusing her of registering the incident with her cell phone and trying to grab the device out of her hands, according to court papers.
Murdock returned to her assigned seat. Later, when Jane Doe came down the hall for drinking, she asked for Murdock if he was going to "boycott" drinks.
BRITISH AIRWAYS PASSENGER, WHETHER NEVER "CRISTED" BY OBESE TRAVELER, LOSES MISCELLANEOUS TO FLY
[1965] 9005] The athlete "did not respond to the obvious race bet", according to the lawsuit.
In a statement, Murdock said that he feared the country's current divisive climate "encourages people to be the worst versions of themselves."
When the plane finally landed, Murdock, a New Jersey native, and Williams escorted by security and interrogation of armed weights from the Transport Security Administration before they were allowed to leave without prosecution.
"Unwarranted" Removal, which occurred in front of other professional athletes and colleagues in Murdock, was humiliating, Murdock and Williams argue in their discrimination lawsuit against United.
A United states Oman said that the company had "zero tolerance" for discrimination and would look at the claims.
This article was originally shown in the New York Post.
