American Airlines' Cover-Up Culture Needs to Change, Women Who Allege Sexual Assault Say

Jun. 3—A Fort Worth flight attendant hopes that her story of sexual assault and retaliation at American Airlines will lead to changes that she and other women say are desperately needed within the airline industry.

Kimberly Goesling, who said she was assaulted by a celebrity chef while on a work trip for American Airlines in 2018, said she and her attorney have heard from "a significant" number of women who say they, too, were the victims of a sweep-it-under-the-rug culture at American Airlines.

Goesling, who lives in Fort Worth, first filed a lawsuit against American Airlines — and the celebrity chef who worked for American Airlines at the time — under a pseudonym in 2020. In May, the 52-year-old filed an amended petition against American Airlines and chef Mark Sargeant. Instead of Jane Doe, Goesling's name was at the top.

For three years, she said, the airline blackballed her and retaliated against her for reporting her sexual assault. American Airlines lawyers called her friends, her family, and even her gynecologist to try and intimidate her, she said.

"I own who I am. I am human," she said. "I am Kimberly Goesling. There is no reason for me to hide anymore."

Since Goesling started to share her story in April, other employees have reached out to her and her lawyer, Robert Miller of Dallas' Miller Bryant LLP law firm. Miller said he could not give an exact number of how many people had come forward, but said it was a "significant" number of employees with accusations as far back at 1977. Current and former employees, mostly women, said they were sexually assaulted by American Airlines coworkers and management threatened them into silence when they tried to report.

"It's clear to us that American Airlines has a very large problem," Miller said. "What they do historically proves that what American Airlines does is when a person complains of sexual assault, they are silenced and threatened with being blackballed."

The problem extends to many corporations, Goesling said, and she hopes her coming forward will help end the culture of sweeping sexual assault incidents under the rug.

In response to the allegations surrounding Goesling's case, American Airlines said in a statement that flight attendants are trained to address a wide range of issues that may arise in flight and "we want our team members to feel empowered and encouraged to report and address sexual harassment and misconduct."

"The inflight policies and procedures we have in place enable us to take swift action where warranted to ensure customers who engage in this behavior onboard are not allowed future travel with American," the statement said. "We have also worked to support our team by providing sexual harassment training to all team members and making it easier to report concerns. If a team member sees or experiences unwelcome advances, we encourage them to report it immediately."

'You cannot start to heal'

In 2018, Sargeant sexually assaulted Goesling inside her hotel room during a work trip for American Airlines, according to her lawsuit. The airline hired him despite a well-documented history of alcohol abuse and sexual harassment, the suit says, and the company kept him even after he acted inappropriately while employed there.

Company upper management drank heavily with Sargeant one night in January 2018, and encouraged him in his pursuit of Goesling, the suit says. One manager, Goesling's lawyer said, even gave Goesling's hotel room information to Sargeant.

At 3:30 a.m., Sargeant forced his way into Goesling's room and sexually assaulted her, according to the lawsuit. The assault was preceded and followed by inappropriate text messages and conversations, she said, and Sargeant admitted he assaulted her the next day. He also later admitted to assaulting her during American Airlines' investigation, according to the lawsuit, and the airline parted ways with Sargeant after Goesling's report.

Goesling said she was stalled by HR for weeks as she tried to report what happened to her. When she was able to make the report, management retaliated against her, she said. First, supervisors insisted she keep the report internal and not file for workers compensation for time off. During an initial interview, an HR representative asked her what she wore during the assault.

The airline removed her from her prominent position and stopped calling her with work opportunities, Goesling said, and the calls to all of her family members and friends started.

"No survivor should have to go through something like that," Goesling said. "It's that continual betrayal, the continual attacks, you start to internalize it. You cannot start to heal."

Sargeant could not be reached for comment, but denied allegations that he sexually assaulted Goesling in an interview with a news organization in Kent, England.

Ongoing problem at American?

The treatment Goesling faced from management at American Airlines follows a pattern of how the airline has handled sexual assault accusations for years, Goesling's attorney said.

After sharing Goesling's story on a public Facebook page, Miller said he started to hear from other current or former American Airlines employees. Two women wrote and signed affidavits.

One of the women is a former flight attendant who wrote that a captain tried to rape her during a layover in 1988. He forced his way into her room and violently grabbed her and refused to leave. When she fought back, he told her this "could be bad for her," according to her affidavit. She eventually was able to get him out of her room.

The next day, an officer on the plane asked her what was wrong, and she told him what happened.

"Oh my god," the officer said, according to the affidavit. "He said on the first day he was gonna rape himself a flight attendant."

Like Goesling, the woman said management discouraged her from filing an official report. When the officer reported the assault to management, an official with the Chief Pilots office told the woman if she went through with the complaint, pilots would not want to fly with her and she would be blackballed. Instead, he suggested the captain write her an apology letter. The woman included the letter in her sworn affidavit.

"I sincerely regret I offended you and hope that you will accept my apology," he wrote. "Your action has certainly given me reason to re-evaluate my thinking towards the airline trip/layover environment."

The airline industry has a problem with reporting and handling sexual misconduct, according to a report published in March 2020 by the National In-Flight Sexual Misconduct Task Force. The task force was created in 2018 due to a rise in sexual misconduct incidents on planes. While the 104-page report focused on assaults on passengers, the report made several recommendations that it said "may also improve responses to reduce sexual misconduct experienced by flight attendants and reduce such incidents."

For example, a lack of tracking and reporting within the airline industry creates gaps in sexual misconduct data in regards to assault on passengers and flight attendants, the report says. The number of sexual misconduct incidents is likely substantially higher than what is reported to the FBI.

For both passengers and airline employees, reporting sexual assault can be complicated. Airlines do not have standardized reporting practices.

In July 2020, two longtime American Airlines flight attendants sued the airline, saying that a pilot sexually harassed them during a flight. Jan Beckman and LeeAnne Hansen, who are both over 60 and worked with American Airlines for over 40 years, said in the suit that the pilot made comments to them about S&M and harassed them. At one point, the lawsuit says, he "forcefully grabbed Hansen by her hips, dug his nails into her hip bones, and repeatedly and violently" thrust against her.

When the women told the captain onboard about what happened, he said he was not surprised, the suit says. He told them the pilot regularly bragged about having sex with underage prostitutes and showed him pornographic photos. He also was known to drink in excess, at one point drunkenly falling down the stairs while on a flight crew shuttle.

The women's attorney, Cathy Coble, said management tried to convince Hansen not to report the pilot because he was close to retirement.

American Airlines, Coble said, treats pilots as assets to be protected, while flight attendants are seen as expendable.

And even though the women had worked with the carrier for decades, they had no idea how to report the sexual harassment. They had received no training on how to handle or report such an incident, Coble said.

Most airlines also do not have standardized policies on training about in-flight sexual misconduct, the task force report says. Only two airlines, Alaska Airlines and Delta Air Lines, have "robust programs to address incidents of sexual misconduct." At other airlines, including American Airlines, sexual misconduct training is encompassed within other training, according to the task force report.

American Airlines shared its policy on sexual misconduct in a statement. Sexual harassment complaints will be investigated by the company and the airline will take "prompt and appropriate corrective action to stop any harassment or inappropriate conduct and prevent its recurrence," the policy states.

The harasser may be subject to discipline, including possible termination. The policy also states there will be no retaliation against a team member who "in good faith, raises concerns or makes complaints of alleged, perceived or actual unlawful harassment or discrimination, or who cooperates in the investigation of such matters."

After Hansen and Beckman went public, American Airlines introduced sexual harassment training for employees. But Coble said the training is not specific to airlines, and instead is a generalized, computerized training.

The airline industry also does not have a common definition of sexual misconduct, the report noted. And unlike most industries, airlines do not have a legal mandate to report criminal activity, such as sexual assault. Cruise lines, for example, became required to report crimes to the FBI with the passage of the Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act of 2010. There is no such law for airlines.

The task force made a variety of recommendations that would help both passengers and flight attendants handle sexual misconduct incidents and reports. Airlines should create clear policies and procedures around reporting methods, the task force said, as well as create a definition of sexual misconduct, standardize data collection and incorporate training to properly handle sexual misconduct cases.

'Sweep it under the carpet'

Mary, a former flight attendant who asked that the Star-Telegram use only her first name, said she rarely had a problem with pilots at American Airlines. But when she did "run into a psychopath," she said she found out that American Airlines is not a safe place to report assault.

In 1977, Mary was in her first year of being a flight attendant at American Airlines, she wrote in an affidavit after she heard about Goesling's story. During a layover, she wrote, a captain on the flight roofied her drink and raped her. She woke up naked in the captain's bed; he told her to go get ready for work sign-in.

Years later, she flew with the captain again and told other flight attendants what happened. They told her the captain had a reputation for drugging and raping flight attendants, she wrote in the affidavit for Goesling's attorneys.

"I did not tell American Airlines what (the captain) did to me because I believed that I would not be believed and that I would be fired," the affidavit says. "American does not like snitches and I believe I would be blackballed by cockpit crew for reporting one of their own."

Goesling said she, too, sensed the hesitancy of victims to come forward out of fear. At one point, Goesling asked a union representative if other women were assaulted, too, why was she the only one speaking up? They quit, he told her, because they could not financially handle the legal fight anymore.

"It's almost as if, I feel, they sweep it under the carpet with hopes that the individual can't fight the fight," she said. "Or somehow you should be thankful you have a job. And you'll get over it."

Goesling refused to take a buyout offered by the company despite her removal from a top position. Instead, she continues to serve as a flight attendant with American Airlines based on the aspects she's always loved about the job — the travel, the family-like atmosphere between flight attendants and the care she takes to treat passengers with compassion. But the past three years have taken a toll.

She said she received overwhelming support just in the 24 hours after she went public. Coworkers she has never spoken to have messaged her to thank her to speaking up.

"That's part of me coming forward," she said. "The only way we are going to change is by standing up and saying this is going on. Because this is not a one-off."

Sexual misconduct in the airline industry

About 68% of flight attendants experienced sexual harassment during their flying careers, according to a survey from the Association for Flight Attendants-CWA done in 2018. The survey found that only 7% of flight attendants who have been sexually harassed reported it to their employers.

Two flight attendants filed a federal lawsuit against JetBlue in 2019, accusing two pilots of drugging and raping them during a layover. The women said the pilots were not suspended after the women reported the assaults.

An Alaska Airlines pilot accused a co-pilot of drugging and raping her during a layover in a March 2018 lawsuit. In an interview with ABC News, the pilot, Betty Pina, said sexual assault is "an under-reported, swept-under-the-rug, not-dealt-with issue in our industry."

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