That’s when she learned a Southwest employee allegedly reported MacCarthy for child trafficking based on a “racist assumption about a mixed‐race family,” according to the lawsuit.
“I took out my phone and started recording,” she said back in 2021. “I have a three-minute video in which I pretty much tell them my life story.”
Police allowed the family to leave after questioning, but the incident didn’t end there. MacCarthy said an investigator with Denver police’s human trafficking unit called her days later about reports from both the department and Southwest.
According to the reports, Southwest alleges MacCarthy and Moira couldn’t find seats together on the connecting flight and requested to swap seats with other passengers. Employees also claim she didn’t let Moira speak with flight attendants, while police state MacCarthy refused to give them information.
Now, the mother is taking legal action due to the “emotional distress” Southwest inflicted with its “blatant racism,” as the filing states. The lawsuit also aims “bring some accountability to the airline and cause them to re-examine their training and policies,” David Lane, MacCarthy’s attorney, wrote in a statement sent to PEOPLE.
“I want Southwest Airlines and the Denver police to be held accountable for what is undoubtedly a case of racial profiling involving a 10-year-old Black girl, who was already suffering the worst day in her life — a death in her family,” MacCarthy said, per PEOPLE.
Reporters also reached out to Southwest for comment, and a representative replied, “We don’t have anything to add right now on this pending litigation.”
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