FILE - Southwest Airlines plane. FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - A Southwest Airlines pilot is suing the company, her union and a former colleague who pleaded guilty last year to dead-bolting the cockpit door during a flight and stripping naked in front of her.Christine Janning alleges that Southwest retaliated by grounding her after she reported Michael Haak to the company and the FBI, that it kept him employed despite an alleged history of sexual misconduct and that managers disparaged her in memos.She also alleges that the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association conspired with the airline and refused to support her.
She is suing Haak for sexual assault. He pleaded guilty last year to a federal misdemeanor charge of committing a lewd, indecent or obscene act and was sentenced to probation.Haak's attorney, Michael Salnick, said Wednesday that his client disrobed only after Janning encouraged him to, never did anything else and that there were no previous incidents.
Southwest said it supported Janning and that it would "vigorously defend" itself against the lawsuit. The union did not respond to a phone call seeking comment.The Associated Press doesn't normally identify people who say they are victims of sex crimes, but Janning through her attorney agreed to the use of her name.According to the lawsuit filed last week in Orange County, Florida, Janning had never met Haak before August 2020, when she was his co-pilot on a flight from Philadelphia to Orlando.
She says Haak, a 27-year veteran of the airline, had used his seniority rights the previous day to bump another pilot who had been scheduled to command the flight.