Federal prosecutors have charged a 20-year-old Orange County for assaulting a flight attendant aboard an American Airlines flight headed to Santa Ana last week.
The Department of Justice alleges Brian Hsu of Irvine punched a female flight attendant twice in her face after the aircraft department from New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport en route to Orange County’s John Wayne Airport.
Officials with the Association of Professional Flight Attendants said Hsu struck the woman after she accidentally bumped into him while moving down the plane’s aisle.
The alleged assault forced the flight to land at Denver International Airport shortly after 6:30 p.m. last Wednesday. The flight attendant was taken to an area hospital to be treated for broken bones in her face, according to the APFA.
Passengers aboard the flight said she had “blood spattered on the outside of her mask” in the aftermath of the alleged attack.
Hsu was arrested at the gate in Denver and sent back to California at some point thereafter. He is expected to appear before a federal judge in Southern California for arraignment later on Monday.
American Airlines also said Hsu had been permanently banned from flying on its planes. Delta Air Lines has called on other carriers to share their lists of banned passengers amid an exponential uptick in incidents.
The FAA has received nearly 5,000 complaints so far this year. Roughly three-fourths of them were mask-related, unlike the incident involving Hsu.
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