By NAN Staff Writer
News Americas, BROOKLYN, NY, Fri. Dec. 11, 2015: Delta Airlines has been ordered to pay a Guyana-born security guard $759,000 in damages after he was arrested and charged for cocaine that was placed in his suitcase by a Delta employee, the New York Daily news reports.
A Brooklyn jury agreed that Roger Levans should receive the lump sum for because he lost his job and was arrested and spent a night in jail because a nefarious Delta baggage handler planted cocaine in his suitcase on a returning flight from Guyana.
Three bricks of cocaine alongside some “cooked rabbit” was found in Levans suitcase in January 2011 after he retuned to the US on a Delta flight from Guyana. He was arrested and spent one night in jail and later lost his job at Yankees Stadium.
But while Levans was free on bail, the feds determined that his bag was indeed tampered with after he had checked his luggage. A corrupt baggage handler apparently had tied a ribbon to the suitcase containing the illicit drugs so it would be recognized by an accomplice in New York City, according to court papers.
“When you go on a plane, passengers play by the rules to ensure it is safe, but Delta was trying to say it didn’t have to play by the rules,” Levans’ lawyer Caitlin McNaughton told the Daily News.
Delta’s lawyer Michael Crowley had argued to the jury that the airline was not responsible for whoever put the drugs in Levans’ bag.
He said the airline will appeal the verdict.
