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Hermès heir handcuffed to seat after row on NY flight
Peter Allen in Paris16.10.08
AN heir to the Hermès fashion house was facing 20 years in prison today after grabbing a pilot's crotch and trying to punch him on route from Paris to New York.
Mathias Guerrand-Hermès, 36, became so unruly on the transatlantic flight that he had to be handcuffed to a seat in first class.
It took the captain and three other crew members to finally restrain Guerrand-Hermès, whose greatest passion in life is polo.
"He was like a man possessed," said a passenger on Tuesday's Air France Flight 008.
Guerrand-Hermès began acting strangely around three hours into the flight. According to papers filed in the US, he had drunk "quite a bit of alcohol" and taken the prescription drug Propofan.
After disturbing a fellow passenger and refusing to return to his seat, flight attendants called the captain, who asked him to calm down. Instead he allegedly grabbed the pilot's crotch, shouting: "I am not going to behave myself", and threw a punch.
He was arrested by FBI agents at John F. Kennedy airport and charged with interfering with flight crew members.
Reader views (6)
He's rich and so will be able to buy his way out of trouble. As for the pilot coming out of the cabin to deal with a drunk, that doesn't say much for Air France security after 9/11.
- Austen, London
Idle curiosity...
"It took the captain and three other crew members to finally restrain Guerrand-Hermès, whose greatest passion in life is polo."
What on earth has his passion for polo got to do with the story? Was the captain wearing underwear labelled as such? Did he have a secret cache of some mints, perhaps, in an unlikely placed hidden pouch?
"Inquiring minds...", and all that.
- Rogan, Irving
There are limitations with regard to luggage that can be carried on a flight so there should be enforced laws on alcohol limits. Enforced and not lightly addressed rules that are not changed for anyone no matter who they are.
- Sam Reagan, London
Should the charge not have been "interfering with a flight crew's member"?
- Dereck, London, England
I love the pun in the final sentence. Beautiful!
- Suzanne Harding, Kensington
Alcohol should be banned in airports and on planes. How much longer until someone gets killed by a drunk passenger?
- Charlie, London
