United Airlines Class Action Says Checked Baggage Policy Unsafe

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Two Hawaii residents have filed a proposed class action lawsuit against United Airlines alleging the airline’s checked baggage policy jeopardizes the safety of passengers.

The 60-page complaint was brought by plaintiff Kathleen M. Watson, who is also joined by Barton M. Watson, a Honolulu attorney representing Kathleen and the proposed Class.

Kathleen Watson was a lead plaintiff in an airline overbooking lawsuit in the late 1970s in USDC, Hawaii that alleged fraudulent misrepresentation. That airline fraud lawsuit mirrored a similar suit by Ralph Nader within the District of Columbia Circuit.

In this prior airline fraud lawsuit, it was alleged that the airline had a duty to disclose its overbooking policy and intentionally failed to do so.

Watson successfully argued the case and as a result, notices were immediately posted all over the United States by airlines giving their customers prior notice of their overbooking prices.

Now, in this recent proposed class action lawsuit filed in Hawaii federal court, Kathleen Watson is bringing similar fraud by omission allegations against United Airlines.

Watson contends that United Airlines has a duty to disclose its checked baggage policy that maximizes ‘unaccompanied suitcases’ on its passenger flights and intentionally fails to do so.

According to the lawsuit filed July 20, unaccompanied suitcases have led to the downing of large passenger airplanes killing all on board and this failure to disclose is “particularly egregious given the magnitude of the potential harm.”

At the center of the case is United Airlines’ undisclosed checked baggage policy that maximizes the unaccompanied suitcases on each departing passenger flight to increase the room available for more profitable non-passenger last minute express air cargo on later departing passenger flights.

Watson argues that under this checked baggage policy, the goal is not to put the passenger’s checked bag on his flight with him, but, essentially, to automatically make every passenger’s checked bag an “unaccompanied suitcase” on a second earlier departing plane.

Basically, Watson states that under this policy, a person intending to cause harm can simply check a bag and leave the airport since the baggage leaves on an earlier departing flight and by the time United Airlines realizes the person did not board his later flight, the baggage has been airborne.

This policy, according to the lawsuit, is not in the best interest or safety of United Airlines passengers and the airline has a duty to disclose to its potential passengers this fact before they and their families fly.

The proposed class action lawsuit references the 1988 Lockerbie Boeing 747 downing caused by an unaccompanied suitcase which killed all 259 passengers traveling from London to New York.

The complaint also mentions the 1985 Air India flight downed by an unaccompanied suitcase that killed all 329 passengers on board from Montreal to London.

In the Air India flight, the unaccompanied suitcase was inspected by a portable sniffer, however the explosive sniffer did not detect the presence of the explosives in the unaccompanied suitcase, the United Airlines lawsuit reads.

Watson is seeking to represent three plaintiff classes.

The first comprised of all of United Airlines millions of passengers who paid consideration to the airline to fly on its passenger flights; the second proposed plaintiff class includes United Airlines passengers who since Jan. 1, 2010 paid a “checked baggage fee” of $25 (or $23 via the internet) to check their bag on a flight with them; and the third proposed subclass of plaintiffs who paid a checked baggage fee since Jan. 1, 2010 but experienced a delay in receiving their luggage because their bag was on a second plane.

Watson asserts that all three proposed classes had a right to know their safety was being jeopardized by United Airlines’ undisclosed checked baggage policy.

Kathleen Watson and Barton Watson are represented by Barton Marshall Watson 1867 A Law Corporation.

The United Airlines Checked Baggage Policy Class Action Lawsuit is Kathleen Watson, et al. v. United Airlines Inc., Case No. 1:16-cv-00400, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii.