Two women have filed federal lawsuits against Frontier Airlines. They claim that the airline refused to help them after being sexually assaulted in two separate incidents.
One of the women was told by a flight attendant that she could not change seats after claiming she was assaulted by a man on a flight from Denver to Providence in October 2018.
The second woman says she was sexually assaulted by a man the following month on a flight from Denver to Florida.
The class-action lawsuit, filed on Dec. 16, states that flight attendants failed to report the incidents to anyone else, failed to request law enforcement to meet the plane upon landing, and did not cooperate with gaining evidence or the identities of the assailants and possible witnesses.
The lawsuit accuses Frontier of failing “to have and/or follow policies and procedures to prevent, report, and respond to sexual assault of its passengers on its flights.”
In a statement, a Frontier spokeswoman said: “The safety of our passengers and crew members is our number one priority at Frontier Airlines and we have strict policies in place to proactively and appropriately respond to reports of misconduct and alleged crimes.”
The lawsuit seeks to represent any other passengers who were sexually assaulted on a Frontier flight since December 2017.
Sexual assault aboard flights is a growing concern for law enforcement, as reported by CNN.
In 2018, the number of sexual assaults reported during commercial airline flights was increasing “at an alarming rate,” the FBI said.
The suit comes two weeks after a group of female pilots and flight attendants sued Frontier, alleging the airline forced them onto unpaid leave while pregnant and refused to accommodate their breastfeeding needs.