Nathan Davis Jr. from Marvelās Runaways and Snowfall filed a lawsuit this week alleging he was kicked off an airplane last December after a flight attendant falsely accused him of possessing a gun, in what the actor believes was a racially motivated incident.
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āI was extremely fearful,ā Davis said in a recent interview with Variety. āI honestly felt like there was nobody there that had my back. I was the only Black man on the plane. I just honestly felt like my life didnāt matter ā I literally felt like this lady was going to take away my life, just by saying that I had a gun.ā
As a result, his attorney George Mallory has filed the racial discrimination lawsuit against United Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines, which operates as United Express, on behalf of United and ManaAir.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CB_iRq7jc-g/
In addition to his work in Hollywood, the 26-year-old is also a TikTok star with more than 9 million followers on the app. After going public with his story he decided to explain his decision to file the suit in which he is seeking $10 million in damages.
āI feel like that I needed to talk about the situation to kind of show people that no matter how much money or fame you have, as a Black man, weāre still gonna have a target on our backs,ā he said. āAnd I donāt want another person to go through this situation who doesnāt have the platform that I have.ā
On the day of the incident he recalls that after taking his seat at the back of a flight from Houston to Nashville, he was approached by a female flight attendant asking him to turn down the music playing through his earbuds.
Davis says that he complied with her request to turn the music down but noticed that other passengers around him were also listening to music on their devices at the same volume without being reprimanded. He goes on to say that the attendant approached him a second and third time about the same issue even after he’d turned the music off entirely.
āThe last time, the third time, I had my music paused, just to see, and she did it again and she was mocking me,ā he said.
When other passengers sitting near him spoke up and said they couldnāt hear his music and felt the attendant was singling him out, the actor began recording what was happening on the plane.
In one clip obtained by Variety, Davis can be heard saying, āSheās literally calling the cops on me for listening to music. Thatās crazy.ā
āI just started recording because I felt like that was the only way the truth was gonna come out, with me recording on my phone,ā he now explains.
According to the lawsuit, the flight attendant had the captain make an announcement that the plane would āreturn to the gate to remove a passenger.ā When they reached the gate, one of the airlineās operations supervisors came on board to escort Davis off and the captain allegedly āattempted to forcefully take away [Davisā] cell phone while he recorded the interaction between the parties.ā
When the stunned actor was allowed back onto the plane to retrieve his belongings, the flight attendant announced over the loudspeaker ‘He has a gun nowā, an accusation that Davis claims was false and hadnāt even been brought up before. Fortunately, this part was also captured on video although at the time he was gripped with fear that police would be waiting for him in the terminal.
āThe whole time Iām sitting there, thinking that thereās about to be all these cops that are about to point their guns at me, or theyāre gonna see my phone and think itās a gun and kill me,ā he said. āIām thinking there could have been an air marshal on the plane that could have attacked me.ā
āI just felt so alone. Iām just thinking to myself, āIām gonna die. Nobodyās gonna know my story; all theyāre going to know is thereās a Black kid in the hoodie and some sweats that just got gunned down by these cops because a flight attendant said he had a gun.āā Davis continued. āI shouldnāt have to wear a suit and tie everywhere I have to go. I should be able to wear what I want to wear. I shouldnāt have to explain to people that my hoodie wasnāt on. Why do I have to say that? Why canāt I just be a human being thatās on a plane ride to go perform?ā
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Fortunately when he got off the staff was much more compassionate towards him than the attendant, which may have something to do with the fact that by then someone onboard recognized him from his Tik Tok and an agent recognized him as an actor.
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