2 JetBlue pilots arrested for beating up a cabbie

Oh my, the bad news about JetBlue staff just keeps piling up.

After the report of a JetBlue Flight attendant harassing a passenger, it is now 2 Jetblue pilots who are in hot water.

The 2 off-duty pilots were in a cab, making their way from an upscale Miami strip club to a local Subway sandwich shop. When they arrived at their destination, they decided that they were too important to pay the $9 cab fare.

Their refusal resulted in a fight with the cab driver, ending with him on the ground with a concussion and a broken right ankle. The incident happened last August and it is not entirely clear from the arrest report why it took the police this long to arrest the 2 pilots.

Of course, this brings me to the most important part of my article; the news reports about this attack seem a little too sensationalist to me. Does it really matter what the profession was of the 2 alleged attackers? Are there professions out there where beating up cab drivers is considered acceptable? (And yes; I realize the irony in this statement, given the fact that I am also writing about it!).

To prove my point; the web page title of the CBS4 article is called “Cabbie Killer Cab“. Nobody was killed, and I’m fairly sure these 2 pilots had no intention of killing anyone.

At the end of the article it is made clear that there is, as always, 2 sides to a story. The cab driver apparently has an anger management problem and the attorney for the pilots claims the cab driver used pepper spray before he was attacked. Whichever side of the story turns out to be true, it is a bad idea to refuse paying your local cabbie, and it is a bad idea to use pepper spray on 2 guys trying to find a tasty sandwich.


What strange things have been found on planes?