Passenger uses blanket to hide himself groping woman next to him on flight, feds say
A passenger kept touching a woman’s thigh on a flight from San Diego to Seattle and grabbed her butt as she stood up to let another passenger exit the row, federal prosecutors said.
Now, the FBI has found and arrested the man more than seven months after the Alaska Airlines flight landed on June 20, 2023, according to prosecutors and court documents.
Desmond D. Bostick, 25, of Federal Way, Washington, is accused of using a blanket he brought on the flight to hide himself repeatedly groping the woman seated next to him in the middle seat, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Washington said in a Feb. 9 news release.
His court-appointed federal public defender, Dennis Carroll, declined a request for comment from McClatchy News on Feb. 13.
After the plane arrived in Seattle, the woman reported Bostick had touched her to the flight crew, and authorities launched an investigation, prosecutors said.
However, law enforcement couldn’t find Bostick after he left the airport that day, according to prosecutors.
In September, Bostick was indicted on a charge of abusive sexual contact aboard the aircraft as his whereabouts remained unknown, prosecutors said.
He “did knowingly and intentionally engage in sexual contact with (the woman), that is, touch (her) buttocks, without (her) permission and with the intent to abuse, humiliate, harass, degrade, and arouse and gratify the sexual desire of any person,” an indictment filed Sept. 27 says.
On Feb. 9, Bostick was arrested, according to prosecutors, who didn’t specify the location of his arrest.
He “is no longer allowed to travel on Alaska or Horizon,” an Alaska Airlines spokesperson told McClatchy News on Feb. 13.
Horizon Air is a subsidiary of the Alaska Air Group, the parent organization of Alaska Airlines.
The FBI continues to investigate the case with the Port of Seattle Police, according to the attorney’s office.
An increase in sexual assaults, misconduct on flights
On Aug. 9, the attorney’s office said reports of sexual assault and misconduct on flights have increased.
The FBI investigated 27 sexual misconduct cases in 2018 and that “number had more than tripled to 90 cases” in 2022, prosecutors said.
The attorney’s office reported there were 62 cases investigated by the FBI in the first half of 2023.
In December, a federal jury found a man guilty of abusive sexual contact on a flight from Paris to Seattle, McClatchy News previously reported.
Since the Seattle man’s conviction, he filed motions for a new trial and for an acquittal, court records show. On Jan. 16, prosecutors asked the court to deny his requests.
Milan Edward Jurkovic, 35, of Seattle, was accused of massaging a 16-year-old girl’s leg after repeatedly offering her candy during the Air France flight in July 2022.
The teen, a Tacoma high school student, was flying home after a school trip overseas when Jurkovic touched her thigh under her blanket for “an extended period of time,” prosecutors said.
Richard A. Collodi, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Seattle field office, said in the Aug. 9 news release that “those who commit these types of crimes aboard aircraft will be held accountable.”
“I’m concerned at the increase of these incidents and assure the traveling public the FBI and our partners will continue to investigate and prosecute any offender who victimizes someone on a plane,” he said.
Federal Way, where Bostick is from, is about 13 miles northeast of Tacoma.
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