An airline crew used duct tape to keep a passenger in her seat because they said she became unruly, fighting flight attendants and grabbing other passengers, forcing the flight to land in North Carolina.
Raleigh, N.C.
Unruly jet passenger duct-taped to seat
An airline crew used duct tape to keep a passenger in her seat because they said she became unruly, fighting flight attendants and grabbing other passengers, forcing the flight to land in North Carolina.
Maria Esther Castillo, 45, of Oswego, N.Y., is due in court today. She was charged with resisting arrest and interfering with the operations of a flight crew aboard United Airlines Flight 645, from Puerto Rico to Chicago.
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Castillo struck a flight attendant on the buttocks with the back of her hand during Saturday’s flight, FBI Special Agent Peter Carricato said in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Charlotte. She also stood and fell onto the head of a blind passenger and started pulling the person’s hair, the complaint stated.
Ankle cuffs kept slipping off Castillo, so the flight crew and two passengers resorted to duct tape to keep her in her seat, the complaint states.
Carricato states that a passenger saw Castillo having drinks in an airport bar before boarding. She bought another drink on the plane. Flight attendants stopped serving her alcohol because of her behavior, the complaint states.
Milwaukee
Teen survives being compacted
Police in Milwaukee said a teenager survived after being accidentally dumped into the back of a recycling truck and compacted.
Police said the 14-year-old ran away from a boot-camp-style school for teens Monday and hid in a recycling bin filled with cardboard.
The bin was picked up by a Waste Management truck and dumped into the vehicle’s rear compactor. Waste Management spokeswoman Lynn Morgan said the truck continued on its collection route, compacting cardboard several times.
The teen wasn’t discovered until the truck dumped its load at a recycling-processing center. He was semiconscious and was taken to a hospital, but police said his injuries were not life-threatening.
Bismarck, N.D.
Lead alert issued about eating game
North Dakota health officials are recommending that pregnant women and children younger than 6 avoid eating meat from wild game killed with lead bullets.
The recommendation is based on a study released Wednesday that examined the lead levels in the blood of more than 700 state residents. Those who ate wild game killed with lead bullets appeared to have higher lead levels than those who ate little or no wild game.
The study, by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the state health department, is the first to connect lead traces in game with higher lead levels in the blood of game eaters, said Dr. Stephen Pickard, a CDC epidemiologist.
Seattle Times news services