Woman thrown off plane in Vt. for not covering up while breast-feeding in 2006 sues airlines

Woman thrown off plane for breast-feeding sues

MONTPELIER, Vt. — A woman who was thrown off an airplane for breast-feeding her child, sparking a day of airport protests nationwide, is suing the three airlines involved in the flight.

Emily Gillette’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Burlington on Wednesday, comes nearly three years after she was taken off an airplane because she wouldn’t cover herself with a blanket while nursing her 1-year-old daughter. Gillette, of Santa Fe, N.M., said she was ejected from the flight as it prepared to take off after a three-hour delay.

Her story generated interest around the nation, leading to a protest “nurse-in” in 19 airports in November 2006.

Gillette’s suit seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages from Delta Airlines, Freedom Airlines and Mesa Air Group. The lawsuit says Freedom uses Mesa aircraft to run flights under contract with Delta, and that Gillette’s flight was booked with Delta.

Delta spokesman Anthony Black said Thursday the Atlanta-based airline does not comment on litigation but supports a mother’s right to breast-feed. A spokesman for Mesa, based in Phoenix, which owns Irving, Texas-based Freedom, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile, the Vermont Human Rights Commission filed a state lawsuit Thursday against Mesa and Freedom. Executive Director Robert Appel said the commission had determined it could not hold Delta responsible for the actions of Mesa and Freedom.

Appel cited a Vermont law that says “a mother may breast-feed her child in any place of public accommodation in which the mother and child would otherwise have a legal right to be.”

Gillette’s lawsuit says she was sitting in a window seat on an Oct. 13, 2006, flight from Burlington to New York City.

Gillette, who was 27 at the time, began nursing her “hungry and tired” daughter, 1-year-old River, and had the toddler “positioned with her head toward the aisle and no part of (Gillette’s) breast exposed,” according to the lawsuit.

A flight attendant brought Gillette a blanket and told her to cover up, but Gillette declined. The flight attendant “forcefully demanded that (Gillette) cover the toddler’s head, stating, ‘You are offending me,’” according to the suit.

When Gillette again declined, the flight attendant got a customer service representative to order Gillette and her family off the plane. Gillette “felt shamed and humiliated” and “tearfully gathered her belongings to exit the plane,” the lawsuit states.

Gillette “has since felt anxiety when she has breast-fed in places of public accommodation, and has felt inhibited from nursing her second child based on her experience” on the flight, the suit says.