Unruly passenger duct-taped to seat on American Airlines flight

An unruly airline passenger was restrained with flexible handcuffs and was duct-taped to a seat as his flight from Texas to New Jersey on Thursday was diverted to make an emergency landing in Baltimore.

According to the Maryland Transportation Police, the passenger was identified as Layne Arthur Lundeen, 67, of Tucson, Arizona, The New York Times reported. He was arrested when the plane landed.

Lundeen, a real estate agent, waived his right to an attorney at an initial court appearance on Friday and was released on his own recognizance, according to the newspaper.

American Airlines Flight 618 was traveling from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport to Liberty International Airport Newark when the incident occurred, according to CNN.

Lundeen allegedly attacked a passenger near him and uttered racial and homophobic slurs, KSAZ reported.

Richard Olenick, 53, one of the passengers who restrained Lundeen, said in a telephone interview with the Times on Saturday that Lundeen began to shout racial slurs at one of the flight attendants.

“He was getting very aggressive and very loud,” Olenick, the owner of Gun For Hire, a shooting range and training center in Woodland Park, New Jersey, told the newspaper.

It was not clear what sparked the incident.

Juan Mejia, a retired law enforcement officer who is a sales manager at Olenick’s company, said the incident occurred about two hours into the flight.

“Just like a light switch, all of a sudden, it went from quiet to yelling and chaos,” Mejia told WCBS. “I turned around to look, and the poor gentleman that was sitting next to him in the aisle seat, the individual had his hands around his neck and was, like, assaulting him.”

“Everything was fine, until it wasn’t,” Olenick told KSAZ.

Lundeen allegedly became physical with his seatmate, striking the passenger’s laptop before grabbing the man’s throat, the Times reported. When a woman sitting a row in front of Lundeen tried to intervene, the suspect allegedly began to attack her as well, according to the newspaper.

Olenick and Mejias were sitting two rows in front of Lundeen when the scuffle started and rushed to help the passengers.

“When you’re on a plane, it’s different than when you are on the ground, you can’t retreat, there’s not a lot of options,” Olenick told KSAZ.

Olenick tried to keep Lundeen’s legs down while Mejia sat down next to the agitated passenger in an attempt to calm him down.

“I started trying to tell him to relax, we don’t want to hurt you, we just want you to settle down,” Olenick told the Times.

A flight attendant gave Olenick, Mejia and a third person a ziptie, which they used to restrain Lundeen’s wrists, CNN reported.

Lundeen then allegedly bit Mejia and tried to do the same to Olenick. That is when the men began using duct tape supplied by a flight attendant, according to the cable news outlet.

A photo shared by Olenick showed Lundeen with multiple loops of tape around his wrists, torso and head, strapping him into his seat, WCBS reported.

Olenick and Mejia remained with Lundeen until law enforcement boarded the plane in Baltimore and took him into custody, WABC reported.

The flight later took off from Baltimore and landed in Newark without incident, according to the Times.

In a statement, American Airlines confirmed the incident. The Federal Aviation Administration and the FBI are also investigating, the Times reported.

Long Realty, Lundeen’s real estate firm -- fired him after the incident, KSAZ reported.

In a public statement, the company said the agent’s actions were “wholly inconsistent with the professionalism, integrity, compassion, and respect for others” that it expects from its team.

“I feel bad for the guy,” Olenick told the Times. “I don’t know what he was going through. What we do know is that he was getting physical with his actions, and we didn’t know where he was going to stop.”

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