DOCUMENT: Sex, Crime

Cops: Passengers Witnessed Duo's In-Flight Hookup

Woman, 48, and man, 28, met onboard Delta flight

View Document

In-Flight Entertainment

NOVEMBER 7--As a traveler napped in the next seat and other passengers looked on, a man and a woman who had just met onboard a Delta Air Lines flight engaged in a sex act, according to newly released police reports.

Responding to a report of “two passengers having intercourse on the aircraft,” airport police responded last Sunday afternoon to a Delta gate at the Wayne County Airport in suburban Detroit.

When cops boarded the Boeing 737--which had arrived from Los Angeles--they encountered Patricia Renee Knight, 48, and Jai Keion Marshall, 28, seated next to each other in row 26 (Knight was on the aisle, while Marshall was in the middle seat). Knight, who lives outside L.A., was scheduled to fly onto Nashville. Marshall was planning to take a connecting flight to Miami, where he works as a bartender.

Asked about their activities onboard, Knight and Marshall denied engaging in any sexual contact. Both passengers agreed that Knight fell asleep in Marshall’s lap. And Marshall (seen above) acknowledged that he “grabbed her breasts on the outside of her clothes.”

Two other passengers and a flight attendant provided police with contradictory accounts of the duo’s in-flight entertainment, according to police records released in response to a Freedom of Information request.

After being informed by a passenger that two occupants of row 26 were “involved in an inappropriate situation,” the flight attendant went to the row and “witnessed the lady in the man’s lap performing fellatio.” The woman, the flight attendant wrote in a witness statement, was “bobbing her head up & down while he was holding her down.” The duo, the flight attendant added, “had a blanket partially covering the ‘act.’”

The flight attendant asked Knight and Marshall for their boarding cards and their names. The employee also requested that Knight “remain in an upright seated position.” For his part, Marshall “tried to apologize to me,” the Delta worker wrote.

One passenger reported that, “Two people in front of me were 4 playing...which wasn’t nice.” Along with noting that the pair engaged in “kissing & blow job,” the passenger remarked that they “felt bad for the guy beside them but I guess he was sleeping.”

Another traveler wrote of witnessing Knight “give the guy next to her in 26E a blow job.” The witness also noted that Knight was in a seat that they had actually been assigned. “Again,” the passenger wrote, “she was in my seat on accident!”

Knight and Marshall subsequently received citations for lewd and lascivious behavior and disorderly conduct. Marshall was released from an airport holding cell after about two hours in custody. Knight was detained two hours longer since her blood alcohol content had initially been measured above the legal limit. When cops attempted to help her get rebooked on a Delta flight, “corporate security advised her that she was not permitted to fly Delta.”

While the in-flight incident was investigated by the FBI, it does not appear that federal charges will be filed against Knight and Marshall. (6 pages)