Sponsored by:
Assemblywoman LISA SWAIN
District 38 (Bergen and Passaic)
Assemblywoman GABRIELA M. MOSQUERA
District 4 (Camden and Gloucester)
Assemblywoman JOANN DOWNEY
District 11 (Monmouth)
Co-Sponsored by:
Assemblywomen McKnight, Murphy and Assemblyman Conaway
SYNOPSIS
Urges FAA to require airlines to adopt policies and require training concerning sexual assaults on airplanes.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
As introduced.
An Assembly Resolution urging the Federal Aviation Administration to require airlines to adopt policies and require training concerning sexual assaults on airplanes.
Whereas, Recent news reports have shed light on the failures of the airline industry in addressing a number of sexual assaults occurring on commercial airplane flights; and
Whereas, On December 7, 2017, the Seattle Times published an article detailing one woman’s account of being groped on an overnight flight, reporting the sexual assault to the flight attendants, realizing that the flight attendants did not have clear or effective guidelines on how to respond to the situation, and then watching her assailant walk off the plane with no accountability for his actions; and
Whereas, On March 15, 2018, the Dallas Morning News published an article detailing a woman’s account of being raped in the bathroom of an airplane traveling from Arizona to New York and how the airline later unsympathetically described the woman’s allegations as a “nuisance claim;” and
Whereas, Both articles indicate that airlines generally have not responded effectively to reports of sexual assault and often do not have written guidance or training on how to manage such reports; and
Whereas, Making matters worse, it appears that no comprehensive statistics exist for in-flight or on-board sexual assaults, despite a study that shows that 20 percent of flight attendants have received at least one report of passenger-on-passenger sexual assault; and
Whereas, As the number of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigations of in-flight sexual assaults has increased over the last four years, experts believe that the cases investigated by the FBI do not capture the full scope of the problem of sexual assaults in the airline industry; and
Whereas, In order to thoroughly address the problem of in-flight and on-board sexual assaults, it is crucial that the airline industry adopt clear policies on in-flight and on-board sexual assaults and begin to provide data on reported sexual assaults on airplanes; and
Whereas, It is altogether fitting, proper, and in the interest of the residents of New Jersey, many of whom frequently travel by airplane, for this House to urge the federal government to require airlines to adopt policies and require training concerning sexual assaults on airplanes; now, therefore,
Be It Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. This House respectfully urges the Federal Aviation Administration to require airlines to adopt policies concerning how employees should respond to reports and allegations of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct that occurs on airplanes, train airline employees on the provisions of those policies, and report allegations of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct to the appropriate authorities.
2. Copies of this resolution, as filed with the Secretary of State, shall be transmitted by the Clerk of the General Assembly to the Secretary of the United States Department of Transportation, the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, and to each member of Congress elected from this State.
STATEMENT
This resolution urges the Federal Aviation Administration to require airlines to adopt policies concerning how employees should respond to reports and allegations of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct that occurs on airplanes, train airline employees on the provisions of those policies, and report allegations of sexual assault and other sexual misconduct to the appropriate authorities.