EXCLUSIVE: I was sexually abused by male passenger sitting next to me throughout ten-hour Air Europa flight - but cabin crew shouted and hurled abuse at ME and my husband
- Emma was travelling from Bolivia to Madrid when she was sexually assaulted
- Man sitting next to her on plane repeatedly pressed himself against her breasts
A British woman today revealed she was sexually assaulted by a male passenger sitting next to her on a ten-hour Air Europa flight to Madrid before being shouted at by cabin crew for crying.
Emma, who is in her 30s, was travelling on a flight from Santa Cruz, Bolivia, to Madrid, Spain, with her husband on Saturday when a man seated next to her began touching her inappropriately with his arm and pressing up against her breasts.
She immediately told a male member of the cabin crew that the passenger had been pressing up against her and wouldn't stop despite her and her husband's insistence - only for the Air Europa employee to 'shrug his shoulders and walk off'.
Emma, not her real name, said the man, who she believes to be in his 60s, kept touching her and ignored her demands for space over a horrific two hours in an incident that left her feeling 'revolted and humiliated'.
Emma, who has previously been a victim of sexual abuse, told MailOnline how the cabin crew did nothing to help her or stop the abuse, instead shouting at her that she was 'crying like a child'.
Emma says she was the one who was forced to move seats and the crew even threatened to ground the plane in Colombia and remove her and her husband from the plane after she told them she was having a panic attack.
'I felt disgusted and completely revolted,' Emma says. 'I was so angry that I had to repeat myself so many times that I didn't want this man to touch me.
'When I got home after this experience, I actually felt broken. It takes so much to attempt to live a close to normal live after sexual abuse and I feel like this took me right back to square one. It triggered all the previous trauma,' Emma says.
She revealed that she and her husband had been planning to start trying for a baby in the next couple of weeks, but this experience has halted those plans because she feels 'numb'.
'I felt numb and disconnected from my own body and and I told my husband I don't think I can try for a baby now. I need some time because it's really debilitating experiencing trauma like that.'
Speaking about her experience on the plane, Emma said that within minutes of sitting down in her seat following a two-week romantic holiday in Bolivia, the male passenger sitting next to her began touching her and pressing his arm against her breasts.
'He was pressing up against me and at first I thought I'd just move my body and try not to use all of my seat, but it was really uncomfortable,' Emma explains.
'I repeatedly asked him not to touch me and to give me space, but he didn't do anything,' she says.
Emma called the cabin crew over and told them that he was pressing up against her, but they weren't helpful and told the Briton and the passenger to 'sort it out' amongst themselves.
'The man continued to press up against me and at points I could feel his arm on my ribs right by my breasts,' Emma says. 'It triggered me so much because I have previous experiences of sexual assault.'
Emma claims that when she called the cabin crew over, an 'aggressive' female cabin crew member waved her finger at the holidaymaker and told her: 'If you do not stop, you'll be in big trouble'.
'There were four cabin crew members stood in the aisle, two of them were shouting at me. Then they left me and I was crying,' Emma says.
'That man was still pressed against me and I was getting more and more agitated and by then it was quite traumatic that so many people did not understand that I did not want to be touched by this stranger.
'I kept telling him to please stop touching me and he just ignored me.'
The cabin crew had initially said Emma could move to the front, but she said she told them it should be the man who was inappropriately touching her who has to move.
But after the man repeatedly pressed up against Emma, she walked to the front of the plane with her in search for an empty seat.
'I was crying in my husband's arms. A male cabin crew member started shouting at us - me particularly - saying that I was behaving like a child,' Emma says.
'He grabbed the phone and said I'm going to get the captain to land the plane in Colombia and drop you there if you don't stop. I was belittled and shouted in front of everyone by the cabin crew. They couldn't understand why I was having this traumatic reaction.'
After this exchange, Emma says she decided to sit at the front of the plane without her husband. 'I couldn't stop crying,' she says.
After an hour or two, Emma started to have a panic attack and she felt like she couldn't breathe. She went to the back of her plane where her husband was able to calm her down and she was given water by the cabin crew.
Emma says she spoke to a male cabin crew member and explained her situation and how the man had been pressing his arm against her breasts and ribs.
'He said to me: "Yes but he was touching you with his arm, not his hands. Do you really think that was sexual assault?",' Emma says.
'He told the female flight attendant that I wanted to raise it as a sexual abuse case and she snorted and rolled her eyes.'
Emma says that the cabin crew eventually moved the man from his seat after five hours.
Emma was considering reporting the incident to police when she landed in Madrid, but she was told by the cabin crew that it would take a while and they would miss their connecting flight to the UK.
She says she did not report it to UK police because she didn't think she would be believed after the cabin crew failed to believe her.
Speaking about why she didn't swap seats with her husband, she said: 'Whenever I experience moments like this, unless I feel like I'm in danger, I would rather stand my ground and say no because it would have stayed on my mind if my husband had had to intervene.'
She said the experience left her feeling 'absolutely disgusted and revolted'.
'I was also angry that I had to repeat myself so many times that I didn't want to be touched - and the man just refused to listen and the cabin crew sided with him instead,' Emma says.
'It was nightmarish. The cabin crew were justifying his behaviour and they were laughing at me.'
'I was triggered because of my previous experience with sexual abuse. It made me feel like my body doesn't belong to me and that all of these people had a say over how I was supposed to be touched.'
Speaking about why she has decided to come forward with her experience, Emma says: 'I don't care about getting my money back. I just want to share what happened because this is a small fight in a really big battle.
'Women live in a society where we sometimes lose our right to own our bodies and experience sexual harassment or abuse on a daily basis.'
Air Europa has been contacted by MailOnline for comment.
https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiemh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmRhaWx5bWFpbC5jby51ay9uZXdzL2FydGljbGUtMTE5ODQ3NzUvSS1zZXh1YWxseS1hYnVzZWQtbWFsZS1wYXNzZW5nZXItc2l0dGluZy10ZW4taG91ci1BaXItRXVyb3BhLWZsaWdodC5odG1s0gF-aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZGFpbHltYWlsLmNvLnVrL25ld3MvYXJ0aWNsZS0xMTk4NDc3NS9hbXAvSS1zZXh1YWxseS1hYnVzZWQtbWFsZS1wYXNzZW5nZXItc2l0dGluZy10ZW4taG91ci1BaXItRXVyb3BhLWZsaWdodC5odG1s?oc=5
2023-04-23 08:23:20Z
CBMiemh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmRhaWx5bWFpbC5jby51ay9uZXdzL2FydGljbGUtMTE5ODQ3NzUvSS1zZXh1YWxseS1hYnVzZWQtbWFsZS1wYXNzZW5nZXItc2l0dGluZy10ZW4taG91ci1BaXItRXVyb3BhLWZsaWdodC5odG1s0gF-aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZGFpbHltYWlsLmNvLnVrL25ld3MvYXJ0aWNsZS0xMTk4NDc3NS9hbXAvSS1zZXh1YWxseS1hYnVzZWQtbWFsZS1wYXNzZW5nZXItc2l0dGluZy10ZW4taG91ci1BaXItRXVyb3BhLWZsaWdodC5odG1s
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