Fired RIM execs 'chewed through restraints' in flight

[Sulako]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/201 ... light.html

CBC News
Posted: Dec 9, 2011 9:07 PM ET
Last Updated: Dec 9, 2011 9:20 PM ET

New details are emerging about the rowdy behaviour of two Research In Motion executives who were fired for disrupting a transcontinental flight – including that they managed to chew their way out of restraints and wound up being subdued by other passengers until the plane landed.

George Campbell, 45, and Paul Alexander Wilson, 38, each pleaded guilty to mischief for disrupting a Nov. 30 flight from Toronto to Beijing.

The plane landed instead in Vancouver, where a court later ordered them to pay $72,000 in restitution. They also received suspended sentences and were placed on parole for a year.

RIM fired both men after investigating what happened, but little information has been made public about what was so disruptive about their behaviour.

However, court documents obtained by CBC News paint a very chaotic picture.

The pair seemed heavily intoxicated from the start of the flight, according to one passenger. They drank, passed out, and woke up to continue consuming alcohol and yelling at one another.

Campbell was described as a "rowdy and abusive" passenger who at one point warned that he would "off people when they left the plane," according to the Crown prosecutor.

One of the men also "assaulted a flight attendant and threatened to punch another," the prosecution said in court.

Crew members tried repeatedly to subdue the pair, but they kept struggling to get free, "verbally abusing" people on board and eventually "chewed their way through their restraints."

As the situation escalated, the pilots decided to divert the plane to Anchorage. But the situation become so dire that they opted for the Vancouver airport, which was closer.

During the final 80 minutes of the flight, "several flight attendants and a couple of passengers" restrained the two men and the crew initiated a "lockdown situation" so that no one was allowed to leave their seats.

The prosecutor in the case called Campbell and Wilson's conduct "way over the top."

"The repercussions for the company as well as every single person on the plane, both financially and perhaps even emotionally, are going to be huge."

Air Canada pegged its losses for diverting the flight at nearly $200,000 and RIM issued a statement saying that the conduct did not fit with the company's "standards of business behaviour."

The two men were on a week-long business trip for the BlackBerry maker, but they were arrested after the flight landed in Vancouver.

Both men live near Waterloo, Ont., where RIM is headquartered.

Campbell refused to comment on the incident when reached by phone on Friday. Air Canada issued a statement but would not answer questions about the case.

[MIQ]

Simply unbelievable this story. My girlfriend (Flight Attendant) had a similiar situation with an unruly passenger enroute from YYZ to Beijing above the pacific. It's a very unpleasant situation for both crew and passengers. Luckily passengers always seem to be supportive helping the crew but having such person on board with still a couple of hours to go (at least to the next alternate) can be really nerve racking. In my opinion penalties/fines for this kind of behavior can't be high enough. Intoxicated or not people should never threat other people, especially in a closed space like an aircraft.

Anyway, definitely one way to terminate your career...

[Inverted2]

Sure this guy wasn't the culprit?

[North Shore]

So if they were 'heavily intoxicated from the beginning of the flight,' then why were they allowed to board?

[mgeni]

Chewed right through restraints huh! Thats real rage...

[ogopogo]

I wish the media would leave RIM outof it..... not relevant. Like RIM needs more bad PR.

These guys were idiots, but it has nothing to do with RIM. I bet if they worked for some obscure company, we wouldn't have heard half of this.

[ScudRunner]

Someone said earlier that if they flipped burgers at Dairy Queen the headline wouldn't have said anything about who they worked for. However they where on company business on company time representing RIM and this is how they acted. Take a lesson from these two idiots when your jump seating or flying down somewhere for sim, you are on company time act like your representing your company.

I think it was Perimeter who lost jump seat passes on AC a long time ago (since reinstated) because of one employee actions, I bet he/she was popular around the flight planning room after that.....

[LisaS]

deleted as just being petty and off topic.

Bandaid

[xsbank]

I wonder if they chewed through their own restraints or each other's? Interesting vision...

I figure civilization is doomed and this is just another example of the demise.

I am always representing my company when I wear my 'uniform' or am on a trip for them; my conduct reflects their trust in me. Even my 'crew' tag has their name on it, as do my business cards. Call me whatever you like, but I attached myself to this host years ago and I have stayed because its the best option. I can party with the best of 'em, but there is a time and a place. Maybe because I am a pilot I think that an airplane is never the correct place?

I agree that if these throw-backs were intoxicated on the ground, somebody with balls should have denied them boarding. Why risk your life and the lives of others - wasn't a recent crash caused by an intoxicated passenger in the right seat?

[Expat]

So if they were 'heavily intoxicated from the beginning of the flight,' then why were they allowed to board?

They call it the "Denver Effect" Blood alcool content at 8000 ft elevation triples in effect.
I know, I live at 8700 ft.

[Carrier]

Quote: "So if they were 'heavily intoxicated from the beginning of the flight,' then why were they allowed to board?"

Quote: "I agree that if these throw-backs were intoxicated on the ground, somebody with balls should have denied them boarding. Why risk your life and the lives of others - wasn't a recent crash caused by an intoxicated passenger in the right seat?"

The performance of the security people at the departure airport, the airline's check-in staff and the flight attendants should be reviewed for incompetence, negligence and dereliction of duty. Drunk pax are supposed to be denied boarding. It did not happen. Those who are paid to protect innocent pax and crew from drunk pax failed. They thereby contributed to this situation. As such they also should be identified and disciplined.

[whiteguy]

Quote: "So if they were 'heavily intoxicated from the beginning of the flight,' then why were they allowed to board?"

Quote: "I agree that if these throw-backs were intoxicated on the ground, somebody with balls should have denied them boarding. Why risk your life and the lives of others - wasn't a recent crash caused by an intoxicated passenger in the right seat?"

The performance of the security people at the departure airport, the airline's check-in staff and the flight attendants should be reviewed for incompetence, negligence and dereliction of duty. Drunk pax are supposed to be denied boarding. It did not happen. Those who are paid to protect innocent pax and crew from drunk pax failed. They thereby contributed to this situation. As such they also should be identified and disciplined.

Amazing how it's still Air Canada's fault for this!!!

When are people going to start taking responsibility for their own actions instead of relying on people to babysit them???

[co-joe]

My god what did they use to restrain them? Licorice?

[shitdisturber]

My god what did they use to restrain them? Licorice?

Licorice handcuffs? Kinky!

Personally I agree that far too much has been made of the RIM connection. RIM handled the situation promptly and correctly in my view; "you were on company business and embarassed the company, good luck in your future career, if you have one!"

[Wilbur]

Sounds like the crew need a lesson on how to apply restraints. Zap strap their hands behind their backs, sit them in their seats and tighten down the lap belts. They won't be going anywhere. Cuffing their hands in front accomplishes very little, which is what they must have done if they were able to chew through the plastic ties.

[OceansEdge]

CBC Follows up, with as much detail as they were able to glean from the court transcripts to answer reader / commenter questions...

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/201 ... ml?cmp=rss

It certainly was an attention-grabbing headline: "Fired RIM execs 'chewed through restraints' on flight."

But that action was only a small part of what a B.C. Provincial Court Judge called "disgusting" behaviour, and what the captain of the Air Canada plane said was nothing like he had ever seen in his 38-year career.

Many people who saw and read our story on the in-flight conduct of former RIM executives George Campbell and Paul Wilson wanted to know more about what transpired on Air Canada flight 31, from Toronto to Beijing earlier this month, judging by the comments on the story.

Were you on board Air Canada flight 31 to Beijing when this incident occurred? We'd like to hear your version of the events.

There have only been two sources of information on this case. The RCMP in B.C. issued only a brief news release on Dec. 1, which gave the basic information: the names of the two men, their offence (mischief) and their sentence ($72,000 in restitution and probation for a year).

But CBC News has now obtained the transcript of the sentencing hearing, which has more detail.

Based on that transcript and some other research we did, here are some responses to the questions posted online:

How could Campbell and Wilson "chew through their restraints"?

With the RCMP and the Crown prosecutor not commenting on the details of the case, we had to rely on the court transcripts.

Prosecutor Gerri-Lynn Nelson told the judge: "They made attempts to get out of their restraints. They chewed their way through the restraints."

She never specified the material they chewed through but said, "they kept getting up and banging on the seats, they weren't listening to the air crew, they tried restraining them with plastic cuffs. One male got out of those so they wound up using tape."

And it does appear one of the men was persistent.

"Mr. Wilson was attempting to break the restraints with his mouth for an hour or two," the prosecutor went on. "As I said, they ultimately chewed through — through the restraints."

Were drugs involved?

There were repeated references in the sentencing hearing to drinking and intoxication. But there was also evidence the two men each took at least one pill.

The defence lawyer, Robert Parsonage, told the court "obviously alcohol was a factor. They also, each of these two gentlemen took a prescription sleeping pill, and that clearly was a contributing factor as well."

You might be wondering what sleeping pill combined with alcohol would create the frenzy described in court. But the prosecutor apparently never did determine that.

She said: "One of them was seen to be taking a pill. We don't know what that was. Hopefully it was a prescription drug, since they were flying into China. One doesn't want to be taking drugs into China."

Why did it matter the pair worked for RIM?

Some of you put the question in much blunter terms, suggesting we at the CBC were trying to discredit the BlackBerry maker. That is certainly not the case.

So, why include it? Well, it is part of the issue in the sentencing.

For example, Judge Ronald Fratkin said "I am mindful of what [the defence lawyer] has said with regard to the punishment that is about to be meted out, not by this court but by the employer because this is totally work-related behaviour.

"The name of the company is on the line, and two representatives of that company behaved in a fashion that not only is alarming, but is before this court having pled guilty to a criminal offence."

It is always a challenge to determine which details to put in a news story and which to leave out. The relevance in the sentencing made their positions (vice-presidents) and the company (RIM) obvious facts to include. The reader can decide whether it has any relevance beyond that.

By the way, there was information from the court transcript we did leave out, including the men's salaries, details about their families and their nationalities. Again, it's all part of the imperfect art of deciding how descriptive a story should be.

Were Campbell and Wilson intoxicated when they boarded and were they served liquor by Air Canada?

It never was an issue in the sentencing hearing. The prosecutor did quote one passenger who said "when the males boarded the flight they seemed quite intoxicated, they drank more, passed out, one would wake up and lean over the little cubicle, slap the other guy on the head because he wanted somebody to drink with, and then they would yell and abuse each other, then they'd pass out, then they'd wake up and start kicking again."

We asked Air Canada to comment but Angela Mah, one of their public relations representatives wrote: "We are declining an on-camera as it is not our policy to discuss such incidents publicly, especially after the courts have dealt with it."

Given the mayhem on this flight, why only a charge of mischief?

I wondered that too. After all, the prosecutor said in court that "Mr. Campbell was threatening to off people when they left the plane."

At another point in the hearing, she said "Mr. Campbell was abusive to [another passenger], threatened him, 'I know who you are and I'll get you.'"

She added that "Mr. Wilson is alleged to have pushed a flight attendant." And later, "there was a threat on one of … to punch one of the other flight attendants."

Should more serious charges have been laid?

The spokesman for B.C. Crown prosecutors, Neil McKenzie, answered in an email: "The charge of mischief was approved based on the available evidence as disclosed in the report to Crown counsel.

"While I can't discuss the specifics of the Crown's assessment of the evidence, the evidence available at the time of the charge assessment did not provide sufficient basis to approve other charges."

Was a pragmatic decision made that guilty pleas on mischief were better than an expensive trial (with witnesses from Ontario and China) on a more serious charge?

Still, how well could the evidence be assessed when the incident happened on a Monday, the charges laid on Tuesday and the sentences handed out on Wednesday?

The transcript indicates that there was a lot here the Crown did not verify, such as the type of pills consumed, which of the men threatened a flight attendant and, most glaringly, the cost to Air Canada of the diverted flight.

Why does it cost so much to land a plane?

At the hearing, the Crown quoted the aircraft's captain as saying the cost of the unscheduled landing was $500,000. Among the expenses were putting everyone in hotels for the night, extra fuel and navigation charges and bringing in a new crew for the resumption of the flight to Beijing.

But that estimate wasn't accurate enough for the judge, who ordered the Crown to verify the costs. When she contacted Air Canada, it turned out the actual extra charges were $193,900.

The speed of this case, from incident to sentencing, may have been a relief to the two men. They were out of court and on their way out of the province before the public knew about the case.

But that swiftness also may have cost them an extra $70,000. It was the judge — not the Crown — who demanded restitution for the costs of hotel, meal and credit vouchers for the passengers. That wasn't part of the pre-hearing discussions between the lawyers.

As the defence lawyer, Robert Parsonage, realized what was happening, he objected to the judge: "At this time, under these proceedings, it's inappropriate … for you to impose or consider imposing some restitution.

"All we have now, we don't have any receipts, we don't have anything except a piece of paper that lists some items."

The judge responded: "Mr. Parsonage, I have your point. I am somewhat sympathetic to your position but I am, quite frankly, absolutely disgusted with the actions of these two individuals who know better and acted like absolutely — well, I can't say it. But that is the punishment that they should suffer."

We have posted his reasons for sentencing on our website. We'll let you know if Campbell and Wilson decide to appeal the restitution order.

[phillyfan]

I want to party with these guys. I just know that when I get busted snorting coke off a strippers back they are gonna bust me out.

[co-joe]

No kidding. Puts some of my wildest nights to shame. I chewed through a whole loaf of white bread toasted with honey in one sitting once, but that was just the munchies... maybe that's the story here. Air Canada's food is so bad these guys had to resort to eating zip ties???

[swordfish]

AC must have been using the beer-&-pretzel flavoured ones, rather than regular. I hope the cost of chewed-up restraints were included in the restitution charges - it would be an 'unfortunate oversight' if they had to pay 20$ for their checked baggage, but get off scott-free with the edible restraints.