Mar 13, 2007 2:12 pm US/Central
Imams Removed From Flight Say They'll Sue Airline
Minneapolis (AP) ―
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Islamic leaders who were removed from a U.S. Airways flight said they will sue the airline. (File)
AP
Six Islamic leaders who were removed from a US Airways flight after a passenger claimed overhearing the men make anti-American comments have filed a lawsuit in U.S. court against the airline, saying their civil rights were violated.
The men, including the president of the North American Imams Federation, were returning from a religious conference in November when they were taken off the plane, handcuffed and questioned after a passenger passed a note to a flight attendant. Before their flight, the clerics had prayed on prayer rugs in the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
When they men returned to the airport the next day, they said, the airline refunded their fare and refused to sell them another ticket.
The lawsuit claims the airline discriminated against the religious leaders and made false statements about them. It seeks compensatory and punitive damages, plus an injunction against future discrimination by US Airways.
"The decades-long movement to advance civil rights in this nation must not be sent into retreat because of post-9/11 fear and stereotyping," Nihad Awad, the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said in a prepared statement Tuesday.
The lawsuit was "brought to ensure that the promise of equal treatment embodied in federal and state anti-discrimination laws does not become a meaningless guarantee for persons perceived to be Muslim and/or Arab and/or Middle Eastern," according to the complaint filed in court.
US Airways Group Inc. has said prayer was never the issue. A passenger claimed overhearing anti-U.S. statements and the men got up and moved around the airplane, the airline said.
The men said they had done nothing that should have been suspicious.
US Airways released a statement Monday saying it had not seen the lawsuit, but that its initial position has not changed: that its employees "acted appropriately, and we continue to back the actions of our crew and ground employees in this case."
The incident prompted a sit-in at a Washington, D.C.-area airport by protesting ministers, rabbis and imams. The Muslim Public Affairs Council also complained to the U.S. Department of Transportation.
The Homeland Security Department's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties said it would investigate.
(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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